LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
Shelf ft 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



. B 






Democracy E 



EMOCRACY .JZ^XAMINED. 



By J. NORCROSS. 



Jas P. Harrison <& Co., Printers, Atlanta, Ga. 



Democracy Examined; 



OR, 



A-CONVERSATION BETWEEN A REPUBLICAN 
AND A MODERATE DEMOCRAT. 



IN TWO CHAPTERS, 



3 



\r 



pA h BY J. 6 NORCROSS. 



Entered according to Act of Congress in 1880, by Jonathan Norcross, in the Clerk's 
office of the District Court of the United States for the District of the State of Georgia. 



ATLANTA GA. : 
Jas. P. Harrison, & Co., Printers and Publishers. 

1880. 



a* 






*V 



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DEMOCRACY EXAMINED; 

OR, 

A CONVEKSATIOlSr BETWEEN A KEPUBLICAK 
AND A MODEKATE DEMOCBAT. 



BY J. NORCROSS. 



CHAPTER I. 



DEMOCRACY DEFINED. 



Democrat. I am not unaware, Mr. JR., that there is a great deal' 
of contradictory and mischievous action arising from the word! 
Democracy, as a party name, and that the party called Democ- 
racy of this country is, or often has been, erratic, wild, and incon- 
sistent in its policy and measures ; and having heard you dis- 
course on this subject, and the evils which, you claim, spring from 
the word Democracy, as a party name, I propose to ask you some 
questions touching the matter — not so much for the purpose of 
vindicating such use of the word, as for the sake of finding out 
how it is, and why it is, that the word, as a party name, is preg- 
nant with evil to society and civil government, if such be the 
case. 

Republican. I confess, Mr. D., I fully believe that the chief 
danger to our political institutions arises from the use of the word 
Democracy, as a party name ; and it is because I believe the time 
has eome,or soon will come, when the safety of our institutions 
will compel the intelligence and patriotism of the country to dis- 
card and put down the word, as a party name, as our fathers did 
at the time of the adoption of the Constitution of the United 
State?, that I am willing to commit these reflections to paper., 

Dem. I will ask you, then, my dear sir : Does not the word 
Democracy mean a government by the people? 

Rep. According to the dictionary, and in the imagination of a 
great many people, it does; but this is evidently a great mistake.. 
In Greece, where the word originated over two thousand years 
ago, it meant a mob, or an insurrectionary party, and which party 
did, indeed, upset and overthrow the government of Athens, and 
all the governments of the Grecian States,, and continued to upset 
and overthrow them until they were reduced, some to an oligarchy, 
some to anarchy, some to despotism, and finally to a state of bar- 



4 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

ba#ism. And the truth is, the word Democracy, as a party name, 
instead of meaning a government by the people, means, today, 

and has, In all ages and countries, meant an Insurrectionary party, 
or an insurrection against law and good order in society; and in 
no country nor age, where it has had full ascendency and sway 
for any considerable length of time, has it ever failed to overthrow, 
or attempted to overthrow, the civil institutions thereof, if any 
such institutions there were to be overthrown. >So we may say, 
in no case has the word, as a party name, meant, in theory or 
practice, a government by the peopie ; but, on the contrary, it has 
meant, and means to-day, the most effective means known for 
uprooting and tearing down long-estarlished laws, customs, and 
institutions. The only circumstances under which the word De- 
mocracy ever has, or ever could imply a government by the peo- 
ple of this country was such as obtained over a few dozen or a few 
scores of people in their neighborhood and municipal affairs in the 
first and early European settlements in this country. But the 
North American Indian tribes present the most complete samples 
of the reign of Democracy and the state of things to which it in- 
evitably leads. And here it may be remarked, that Democracy, 
in its radical sense and last analysis, means a government, if a 
government it may be called, without fixed laws, forms, or offi- 
cials of any kind, or a reign where a people all assemble together 
to punish offenders, or to make war upon its neighbors, or peace 
with them, as the case may be, without regard to precedents or 
rules of any kind, which facts, therefore, as a matter of course, 
preclude the possibility of a purely Democratic government over a 
"\ community amounting to a nation, a state, or a city. It may be 
assumed, therefore, that the word Demociacy, as a party name 
an\l lesignation, or as a principle of political action, still means, 
in fctojory and practice, insurrection against regular government 
as w^Jl as against sound and time-honored political principles; 
and instead of meaning a government by the people, or for the 
people, or a government of any kind, except for a few dozen or a 
few scores of good men, who are a law unto themselves, it means, 
in theory and practice, a refuge of treason, stratagem, and crime — 
that is to say, treason against wise and stable government, wheth- 
er by a Constitution or organized laws of any kind, and a party of 
stratagem, inasmuch as it always follows men who are ever plot- 
ting the overthrow of some venerable institutions and safe-guards 
of society, and a party of crime, inasmuch as it is held together, 
as one of its great lights has said, solely by the cohesive power of 
public plunder ; and if there ever was a Democratic party that 
did not ripen into an insurrectionary or revolutionary party, it 
was because surrounding circumstances restrained and prevented 
the full development of its devilish spirit. 

WHAT IS A GOVERNMENT BY THE PEOPLE? 

Dem. Indeed, sir; this is to me startling language, and contrary 
to the popular belief :' but before you proceed to demonstrate the 
truth of these declarations, as I suppose you aim to do, allow me 
to ask you what you mean by a government by the people ? I take 
it for granted, you believe in such a government. 

Bep. Most assuredly I believe in such a government. But be- 
fore proceeding to define what is meant by a government by the 
people, let me remark that government and laws are essential parts 
of God's universe, and that we cannot conceive of harmony, or 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 5 

order in earth, or in heaven, in mind, or in matter, without a gov- 
ernment or laws. A civil government is just as essential to the af- 
fairs of mankind in civilized life, as heat, light, and gravitation 
are to the material world. A civil government and laws by the 
people imply the existence, either in form, or essence, of all the 
departments of government, such as the executive, legislative, and 
the judiciary departments, with officials, to execute, make, and 
administer the laws. And where all these officials, and especially 
the legislators, or law makers are all elected by the honest votes 
of the people, under well-defined forms, and at certain periods, 
and especially a government where the intelligent, the learned, 
and moral have a full share of influence, and power, in shaping 
and administering the laws, and where the weak, as well as the 
strong are fully protected in their rights and privileges; such a 
government is a government by the people. But a government 
that is in the hands, or under the control and direction of the ig- 
norant and vicious portion of society — that very portion which 
government is intended to curb, and restrain from acts of violence, 
is not a government by the people; but a government of mobs, a 
government of gamblers, thieves, and robbers, whose reign is worse 
than that of despotism, and soon becomes a despotism, in the hands 
of a few, and not unfrequently to the great relief of the moral and 
intelligent portion of society. 

Dem. But do you claim that the word Democracy, as a party 
name, brings together and crystallizes into a party, all or nearly 
all these bad and dangerous elements of s< ciety? 

Rep. Certainly, I do, and claim that the word Democracy is 
more potent for bringing together, and moulding into a party the 
vile and dangerous elements of society than any other word or 
name known "to any language. And indeed history and experience 
show that is the very word, the very name wbieh'is always chosen 
for the basest of political purposes, and that it never is, and never 
has been, chosen as a party name, except for some vile or revolu- 
tionary purpose. It is true there are many good people who hon- 
estly believe that a Democratic party means a government by the 
people, and that its intentions, as a whole, are good. It is also true, 
that owing to the restraints sometimes thrown around the Demo- 
cratic party, by outside intelligence and healthy public sentiment, 
such a party is sometimes held back from the gratification of its 
instinctive purposes, appetites, and propensities; but a Democratic 
party in name, or essence, is unavoidably dangerous and always 
will, and always must, plunge the people into anarchy, or some- 
thing worse, as soon as it gains full sway. The law T s of God and 
the laws of nature declare that ignorance and depravity cannot 
and must not bear rule over virtue and in telligence, unless the same 
God, and the same nature has also decreed that they shall operate 
as a scourge to any people who tolerate Democracy, as a party 
name. In such a party, the vile portion will always gain control 
and give direction to the whole, despite the good men, and now 
and then an honest and patriotic leader found therein. The morale 
of any party determines its acts and course, and its morale is de- 
termined by the motives that animate it and if those motives are 
determined solely by the love and ambition for the spoils of office 
and power, in its acts and course, it will disregard all higher mo- 
tives, all truly patriotic principles. That the spoils of office and 
power measure the morale and motives of a Democratic party is 
manifest from the fact that our present Democratic party has been 



6 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

found on every side of every question before the country for the 
past fifty years, except stale sovereignty and war upon the govern- 
ment. For both of these, it has exhibited wonderful and extraor- 
dinary consistency, and it is this consistency in these measures 
that constitutes its only "time-honored principles/' and hinds to- 
gether the elements of which a Democratic party is always com- 
posed. 

HOW REPUBLICS ARE OVERTHROWN. 

It is not to be disputed, or refuted, that it has been a Democratic 
party in essence, or name, which has overthrown, or prepared the 
way for the overthrow of, every Republican form of government 
set up in any independent community, and which, by the way, 
may be numbered by the hundreds ; and it may also be confidently 
asserted that no Republican form of government, once established 
in such a community, has ever been overthrown without the reign 
or intervention of a Democratic party, or the arms of a conquering 
foe. And the reason of it is plain. There is not, and never has 
been, any word or name, I repeat, other than that of Democracy, 
in this or any other language, under which the bad and dangerous 
elements of society could be brought together and so successfully 
directed against the principles and bonds of civilized society ; and 
it is probably the only word or name under which a party has ever 
gained strength from the outrages and crimes it has committed, 
and which it generally does until its outrages and crimes become 
insufferable by any people. But for this word, this name of evil 
omen and history, there is, there can be no reason given why a 
Republican government, once established, should not be as stable 
and as long-lived as that of Monarchy in any enlightened nation. 

THE CONSTANT DANGERS FROM DEMOCRACY. 

Bern. I am aware, Mr. R., that the congregation ancl co-oper- 
ation of the ignorant and depraved, the prejudiced and the ambi- 
tious in one party comprise the chief danger which overhangs 
free institutions. But tell me again, are there not elements or 
traits of human character, irrespective of party or party names, 
which are inimical and dangerous to free government, and always 
ready to coalesce and co-operate for its overthrow under any name 
or rallying cry that may happen to be adopted by influential and 
ambitious leaders ? 

Hep. Unquestionablv there may be such dangers under any 
party name, and the province and doty of the virtuous,, the intel- 
ligent and the patriotic is to curb and restrain them within reason- 
able bounds by wise measures and laws, and such division of these 
dangerous elements among parties as wisdom and patriotism may 
suggest or approve. But it is not to be denied that the word De- 
mocracy, as a party name, has a fascination and an incitement for 
the ignorant and depraved that is found under no other name ; nor 
is it to be denied that the wise and prudent in every country and 
age have had a corresponding fear and dread of Democracy as a 
party name. Witness the fact, well known in our own country, that 
in a Democratic party has ever been found all, or nearly all, the 
gamblers, thieves, robbere, the dead -beats and loafers — or, in other 
words, that all who are opposed to law and government of any 
kind, which is a large portion of any society, and who prefer to 
take their chances amid anarchy or revolution to submission to 
law and order,, have been found in the Democratic party. And 



DEMOOBACY EXAMINED. 7 

then, again, there is in every community quite a large class of cit- 
izens who have no faith in, and no use for, a free government ; a 
class who want to be lords and masters over the people, and to 
transmit this right to their children ; a class, and not a very uninflu- 
ential one, who believe in, and hanker after,a Monarchy and aris- 
tocracy. Nor is it to be denied that this class almost invariably 
join themselves to a Democratic party wherever one exists in a 
free country, believing, as they do, and as the world at large 
knows, that a Democratic party offers the shortest and surest road 
first to an anarchy, then to despotism, and to Monarchy and aris- 
tocracy in the end. And who, too, does not know that the foreign- 
ers who come to our shores, knowing nothing of our language or 
institutions, including anti-Protestant priests and other religious 
fanatics, and who, by the way, have been raised under Monarchies 
almost invariably join themselves to the Democratic party, and co- 
operate with it in every step which seems to lead to the overthrow 
of our laws and customs, as illustrated by the anecdote of the 
newly arrived Irishman, who, on being asked what party he in- 
tended to join, said, " Faith, and be shure, I don't know, only I'm 
against the government.'' In view of all these facts, who is so blind 
as not to see that a Democratic party constitutes a standing men- 
ace and danger — nay, an active menace and danger to the glorious 
Kepublican institutions established by our fathers ? "Who does not 
see that such a party is constantly digging up evil in every field 
and pouring out of its mouth the fires of hell upon the fair fruit- 
age and cherished laws and customs of the land ? And hence it 
comes to pass that w T hile the Republican form of government may 
be overthrown under other parties, and under other names, and 
while such a form of government may never be established in 
other countries, owing to prevailing ignorance and depravity, the 
word Democracy, as a party name, greatly hastens and facilitates 
such an overthrow, where such a government is already estab- 
lished, by the facility and rapidity with which it collects together 
the inimical and disintegrating forces. Under a Monarchy, or any 
other form of government than that of a Republic, a Democratic 
party is unendurable, and is prohibited as a rebellion or revolution 
against the laws of God and man, and why should not a party and 
a name which constantly draws into its fold, like the voice of 
Satan, all the evil spirits of the universe, and throws off its patri- 
otic leaders for some of the baser sort, be counted a dangerous 
party among any people? Verily, with the whole mass of de- 
praved and vile spirits of angels and men organized into a party 
&nd infu'l blast, may Mr. Toombs or any|other rebellious spirit de- 
clare that the Constitution of the United States, or that of any 
other country, lacks the strength for its own preservation. 

THE TENDENCY TOWARD DEMOCRACY. 

The answer of the newly-arrived Irishman., when asked what 
party he was going to join, that he was opposed to the government, 
was significant of the sentiments of a vast number, both under 
Republican and Monarchical forms of government. Under the 
latter, it may arise in part from real or supposed oppression; but 
under the former, it unquestionably arises, in a great part, from 
the unceasing carping and croaking of Democratic demagogues 
about the tyranny and exactions of government, when and where, 
in truth, there is, and can be, no cause of complaint, as in the case 
of a constitutional and well regulated Republic like our own, 



8 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

When this carping and croaking, therefore, not against measures 
only, but against the government itself, is constantly kept up, as 
it always is by the leaders of the Democratic party, it operates as 
a powerful reinforcement of the natural enemies of all government, 
and all laws, thereby adding greatly to the danger always over- 
hanging free institutions. Nor can it be denied that the influx of 
foreigners into our country, habituated as they mainly are to op- 
pose government and laws, under which more or less tyranny ob- 
tains, reinforces the native and instinctive Democracy, and thereby 
adds greatly to the dangers of free government, and should arouse 
the patriotism pf the country for its defense and preservation. 
Nor can any one deny that it is this Democratic element, in the 
hands of wily leaders, which has often forced the most virtuous 
and patriotic to accept despotic rule, instead of constitutional and 
free government, believing as they do, that the very classes by 
which despotic rule is brought about are the parties who suffer 
most from it. Again, reason as we may, civilized society, stable 
government, learning, science, and laws go hand in hand in all 
their stages, from barbarism up to the highest elevation. But, 
reason as we may upon minor topics, we may suppose that no 
honest man can be so ignorant as not to know that it is fixed and 
stable government, equitable laws, and civilized arts that provide 
for the sustenance and happiness of millions, when but a few hun- 
dred savages could, without them, find only food and shelter. 
Reason, too, as we may, the great warfare, on the part of the 
learned, the virtuous and patriotic, is for these great principles of 
human existence and progress, while, on the other hand, the war- 
fare of sin and depravity, avarice, ambition and radical Democ- 
racy is against them. 

Bern. Do I understand you, Mr. R., to be giving the true senti- 
ments and character and drift of Democracy in this country and 
in this age of the world? 

Rep. I mean that Democracy, as a party name and organiza- 
tion, is the same everywhere. In material nature, the presence, 
and union of certain ingredients tend to durability and strength, 
while in the presence and union of certain other ingredients, rapid 
decomposition and rottenness follow. 

So it is in the religious world, so it is in the political world, and 
so the word Democracy, as a party name and organization, brings 
together elements, sentiments and motives which are utterly de- 
structive of civil government, and liberty itself, whenever and 
wherever these elements are not beaten back by some more con- 
servative and healthy power, such as beat back the early Democ- 
racy of our country at and about the time of the adoption of the 
Constitution of the United States, under the lead of Washington, 
Madison, Hamilton and their compeers; or such as beat back the 
more modern Democracy with shot and shell from 1861 to 1865. 
It is impossible for a name and organization which scoops up and 
brings into active co-operation all the elements of opposition to 
law and order, all the elements and characters which civil govern- 
ment was intended to restrain and reform, without endangering 
government and laws, such as form the bulwarks and founda- 
tions of society. 

A safe administration of government and laws implies that the 
most intelligent, virtuous and wise are in power; a bad one, that 
the depraved bear rule. "When the righteous are in authority 
the people rejoice, but when the wicked bear rule the people 



•DEMOCEAY EXAMINED. \) 

mourn. H The history of this party in our country, called the 
Democracy, and the fearful calamities it has brought upon the 
land when in power, show clearly enough whether it, or its oppo- 
nents, comprise the righteous ; whether it or its opponents have 
caused the people to mourn ; whether it or its opponents have 
caused the people to rejoice. 

Dem. I was, and still am, under the impression that the De- 
mocracy of this country have advocated, and carried out, 
some excellent measures, and, if so, how do you make it out that 
it is always dangerous ? 

Bep. I doubt not that I can explain to the understanding of 
any one, how a party essentially vicious in its instincts and ele- 
ments, may be the authors or cause of some good deeds. Indeed, 
the Good Book informs us that God causes the wrath of man to 
praise Him, and the remainder of wrath He will restrain, and 
that where sin abounded, virtue shall much abound. Neverthe- 
less, while this may be the case, the authors of evil have no title 
to credit. In the first place, then, civilization, and civilized arts 
and laws are not the work of a year, nor of a single generation ; 
but the works and fruits of the purely philanthropic, through cen- 
turies of time. Without good men no such fruits are produced. 
Without good men, no city, state, or nation is ever built up, or 
preserved from distruction. Without good men, each city, each 
state, and each nation is in danger of destruction, from showers of 
fire and brimstone, or what is equally bad, the scourge of devils in- 
carnate in the shape of men. Our American civilization, institu- 
tions, and laws have come down to us, in part at least, from the 
times of Alfred the Great of England, and the people of that day 
inherited, in part at least, their civilization, and civilized arts from 
the Hebrews, Greeks and Romans. But these once embedded in 
the customs and laws of the people, can only be uprooted and 
changed by centuries of time, or by exterminating wars and revo- 
lution. If such a thing could happen to this country, as to have 
a Chinese Mandarin placed in the Presidential chair, and Chinese 
politicians fill all the seats in Congress, such an administration 
could hardly fail to enact some good laws, and administer the gov- 
ernment in accordance with our fundamental principles, after the 
style that the Romans governed conquered nations, that is, accord- 
ing to their own laws. Indeed, the truly Chinese or Democratic 
style of their tribunals, which consists of one man as judge, jury, 
law-giver and executive, and the trial and punishment of (crimi- 
nals at short shrift, upon the spot, could not be introduced, nor 
could that other truly Democratic and Chinese style of disposing 
of commercial credits, by the punishment of both the debtor and 
creditor with stripes, be' introduced into our country, without the 
sudden disruption of all order, and the burning up of all the law 
books, the Bible included. So too, if such a thing could happen 
as to have the most consummate native knave in the land in the 
Presidential chair, and the members of Congress made up of noto- 
rious villains, such as the Democracy sometimes elect in individual 
cases, even such a government and administration would hardly 
fail to enact some good laws, and do some other commendable 
things. Nor would these men, by any means, undertake to up- 
root and destroy the settled customs of the people, and hurry the 
country at once into ruin. Like the Tammany Democracy of 
New York City, with thirty millions of revenue upon which to 
fatten, they would hesitate to rip up the goose that laid the golden 



10 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

egg. So the national Democracy, or any other party however vile, 
may carry into effect many good measures, while at the same 
time, they may be carrying the country to certain moral and po- 
litical ruin. 

PROGRESS IN THE ABSENCE OP DEMOCRACY. 

The truth is, no party or set of men, whether under a Monarch- 
ical or Republican form of government, that does not embrace the 
most learned and virtuous, the most upright and pure in heart and 
practice, can long be in authority without bringing fearful calam- 
ities upon the land. 

Bern. But tell me, sir, did not the Democratic party rule this 
country, in the main, from the days of Jackson down to the com- 
mencement of the great Rebellion, and did not the country prosper 
under its rule ? 

Bep. Yes ; but while this was the case, and when the modern 
Democracy came into power, the government had been in the 
hands of pure and patriotic men for more than forty years — men, 
in the main, who had fought through the Revolution, gained our 
independence, and formed the Constitution of the United States. 
During these forty years the laws had been greatly perfected, and 
the habits and customs of the people assimilated thereto. Or, in 
other words, the habits and best interests of the people, as well as 
the wisdom and virtue of the land, had been enacted into laws, 
both State and national, Or, to state the case in another form, an 
advanced civilization and advanced state of arts, science and re- 
ligion, had been everywhere established, and had taken deep root 
in the minds and customs of the people. In this state of things, 
it was hardly possible for this tide of progress and prosperity to be 
turned back in a single generation by any party or set of men, 
however powerful or vile, without some fearful convulsion or rev- 
olution. And hence we may say the people prospered in spite of 
Democratic rulers, as France flourished in the days of Louis the 
Fourteenth, or as England flourished in the days of Charles the 
Second, or appeared to flourish, upon licentiousness and vice; 
albeit, each of these administrations brought, in the end, fearful 
calamities upon the people. Then, again, long before the accession 
of modern Democracy to power in this country, the high tide of 
immigration and capital from Europe had set in, as a consequence 
of these former administrations, thereby giving an upward impulse 
to a growing nation. And still, again, after the accession of De- 
mocracy to power, outside of the party were found the most able 
and patriotic statesmen of the land, who held the Democracy back 
from several nefarious schemes, and exerted their influence to 
make the best of such measures as it carried into effect, and to 
reconcile the people to the loss of such measures and principles of 
the Revolutionary fathers as it overthrew. Who does not know 
of the patriotic words and acts of Webster, Clay, Berrien, and 
Crittenden while this Vandal policy of Democracy was being car- 
ried out ? 

But the best and only true test of the character and tendency of 
a party in power, animated by wrong principles and motives, is to 
be found in the fruit it bears and the calamities to which it leads. 
Let us, therefore, take a short retrospect of the history of Demo- 
cratic parties in our own country, while we also occasionally advert 
to the history of the word, as a party name, in other countries. 
The American Revolution was commenced, fought, and independ- 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 11 

ence won without any party or parties by the name of Democracy. 
"The Friends of Liberty,'' "The Sons of Liberty," and "The 
Friends of Independence" formed the rallying cries and names 
under which our forefathers organized, legislated and fought 
through that eventful period. Or, if they had any other cry or 
name to stimulate one another, it consisted in what they called 
Republican principles and a Republican form of government, as 
contrasted with and opposed to the royal arid aristocratic princi- 
ples of Great Britain. 

By royalty and aristocracy is meant, and was meant at that 
time, classes of men holding a hereditary or patent right to rule, 
and to transmit that right to their children, without any right on 
the part of the people to elect them to, or remove them from, 
office. It was, therefore, under these names, and with these objec- 
tions to the government and institutions of Great Britain, that the 
American Revolution was undertaken by the American people, 
and their independence won, and not under the name or incite- 
ment of the word Democracy. 

But even before the victory was won, and independence fully se- 
cured, the demagogues in every part of the land began to call 
themselves Democrats and organize Democratic clubs, and by the 
time independence was acknowledged, nearly every State govern- 
ment was in the hands of what they claimed as the Democratic 
party, but which soon proved to be composed of the vile, the de- 
praved, and the reckless of every kind, with a few good citizens, 
whose names were used to give the party the appearance of re- 
spectability. But, as we shall see, it soon proved to be the scourge 
of the country, and, strange as it may seem to some at this day, 
it first ripened into its instinctive vileness in the then great and 
intelligent State of Massachusetts, and after a round of some five 
or six years, it culminated in what has been called Shay's Insur- 
rection. Its principles consisted of complaints against the high 
salary of the Governor and other officials, which, it claimed, 
should not be above the wages of common laborers— or, at best, 
no higher than those of mechanics. It next attacked the State 
Senate as being an aristocratic and superfluous branch of the gov- 
ernment ; and, thirdly, that the government ought to issue paper 
money in sufficient quantities to give each man a plenty — claims 
very much in accord with those of modern Democracy in our 
country. Upon these issues the party set on foot an insurrection, 
and put into the field an army of some fifteen hundred armed 
men, which, after committing many robberies and other crimes, 
was met by about the same number of good citizens, well armed, 
and in the first battle, and after the fall of some twenty or thirty 
insurgents, they were scattered to the four winds, never again to 
appear in the old Bay State, thus demonstrating, at the outset, 
that a Democratic party is, in reality, a party of treason, strata- 
gem, and crime. This was in 1785 ; and although it did much 
harm, from that day to this the Democracy has never gained a 
complete ascendency in that State, and this latter fact, in part at 
least, accounts for the high intelligence, enterprise, wealth, and 
prosperity which have always obtained in Massachusetts, notwith- 
standing her paucity of natural resources. 

THE OLD DOMINION DEMOCRACY. 

The next, and most notable point at which Democracy broke 
out, and soon gained preponderance, was in Virginia. This State 



12 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

had boon, as is well known, previous to the Revolution under the 
influence and control of an aristocracy similar to that of Great 
Britain, and which, under the leadership of Thomas Jefferson, was 
torn up by the roots, but unfortunately gave political power into 
the hands of the vast crowd of ignorant and vicious people found 
in that State, headed by demagogues calling themselves Demo- 
crats, who were soon organized into a raving and ranting party 
that would have done credit to the Democratic party in the streets 
of Paris, in the nosiest days of the French Revolution. John Mar- 
shal, who was afterwards Chief-Justice of the United States, said 
"the people idolized Democracy." Certain it is that Democracy 
took deep root in Virginia, at a very early day, and so strong a 
hold had it gained upon the people that by the time the Constitu- 
tion of the United States was ready for adoption, the government 
of that great state had degenerated into a farce, or a satire upon 
government. To form some idea of the mob-like character of the 
Legislature, and the impotence of the government as a whole, the 
following extract is taken from a speech of Governor Edmund 
Randolph, delivered in the Virginia Convention of 1788, called to 
ratify the Federal Constitution. After giving a graphic account of 
the horrid state of morals, commerce, industry, and manners, he 
said "a man who was a citizen was deprived of his life, thus from 
mere reliance on general reports, a gentleman in the House of Dele- 
gates informed the house, that a certain man (Joseph Phillips) 
had committed several crimes, and was running at large, perpe- 
trating other crimes. He therefore moved for leave to attaint him. 
He obtained that leave instantly, and drawing a bill from his 
pocket it was read three times in one day, and carried to the Sen- 
ate. He was attainted speedily, and precipitately, without any 
proof better than vague reports, without being confronted with his 
accusers and witnesses, without the privilege of calling for evidence 
in his behalf. He was sentenced to death and was afterwards ac- 
tually executed. " No one who is able to read and understand the 
force of this occurrence can fail to comprehend the deplorable con- 
dition of the then great state of Virginia, or to see that it had 
arisen in the main from the baleful incitement of the word De- 
mocracy as a party name, and the unavoidable influence that it 
has in placing the vilest elements of society at the head of political 
affairs, and in thrusting the virtuous, the learned and the wise 
back to the rear, and under the feet of brutish power. And now, 
although the adoption of the Constitution of the United States had 
the effect to banish the word Democracy, as a party name, and or- 
ganization, from the country for the next forty years, and which 
banishment operated as fire, separating the dross from the pure 
metal, notwithstanding the adoption of the glorious Constitution, 
and the glorious effects upon the people and country at large, and 
notwithstanding the vast natural resources of Virginia, and the 
large number of her great men, whose influence has been felt 
throughout the land, and the world, the word Democracy, and its 
blighting spirit had obtained so firm a grasp upon the people, had 
struck its roots so deep into its soil, that great state seems to have 
remained from this very cause, in a moral, political and commer- 
cial paralysis ; while other states far less favored by nature, and 
less contaminated by the name, and the vile demagogues it breeds, 
have shot ahead and left the Old Dominion far in the lurch, in 
all the elements of greatness and prosperity. 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 13 

MORAL AND POLITICAL DEGENERACY. 

From these two States, Massachusetts and Virginia, the name 
and spirit of Democracy flowed out into other States, carrying the 
most absurd and wild' notions of liberty and reform among the 
ignorant masses, but at the same time spreading consternation 
and alarm among the moderate and reflecting portion of the peo- 
ple. The records of these times, given by hundreds of writers, is to 
the effect that the lowest class ol demagogues soon obtained control 
of the municipal offices, and especially the State governments, 
rendering- them more noisy and reckless than the primary assem- 
blies of the people ; and these State governments, in turn, turned . 
nearly all the men who had signed the Declaration of Inaepend--^ 
ence and led in the war, out of the Continental Congress, and 
filled their places with second and third rate men, and, in some 
cases, with the most dissolute and dishonest characters, thus leav- 
ing the whole government machinery to be run and controlled by 
these charlatans, or by a few more artful and ambitious men, who 
were willing to see the States relapse back into the hands of Euro- 
pean powers, or divided into several leagues, and launched one 
against another, provided they could secure aggrandizement to 
themsel ves and their children. Confusion and uncertainty reigned 
supreme. The courts were either extinct, or utterly inadequate to 
administer justice or preserve order. Commerce and commercial 
honesty, except among a few, had disappeared, and those who had 
the industry and prudence to collect a little wealth were denounced 
as bloated nabobs, whose possessions ought to be divided among 
their neighbors. Idleness and poverty stalked abroad, and civili- 
zation and civilized arts seemed about to depart, never to return. 
In a word, the whole country, except a few neighborhoods, was as 
completely demoralized and democracized as the most ardent So- 
cialist of modern times could have desired. But perhaps a more 
concise and comprehensive description of the then condition of 
things is found in the inaugural address of John Adams, the sec- 
ond President, eight years after the adoption of the Constitution. 
He refers back to these times, and the old articles of Confederation 
under which, as a matter of course, Democracy and Democratic 
State sovereignty had full sway and a fair field to exhibit its in- 
stinctive qualities : 

"Negligence of its (the Confederation's) regulations, inattention 
to its recommendations, if not disobedience to its authority, not 
only in individuals but in States, soon appeared, with their melan- 
choly consequences, universal langor, jealousies and rivalries of 
States, decline of navigation and commerce, discouragement of 
necessary manufactures, universal fall in the value of lands and 
their produce, contempt of public and private faith, loss of con- 
sideration and credit with foreign nations, and, at length, in dis- 
contents, animosities and combinations, partial conventions, and 
insurrections threatening some great national calamity." 

"In this dangerous crisis, the American people were not aban- 
doned by their usual good sense, presence of mind, resolution and 
integrity." Measures were pursued to concert a plan to form a 
more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, 
provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and 
secure the blessings of liberty. The public disquisitions, discus- 
sions and deliberations issued in the present happy constitution of 
government." 



14 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

And here it may not be amiss to quote a few words from the first 
inaugural address of President Washington, and although not on 
the same line of facts which were weJl known to him, they show 
his extreme anxiety for the success of the new government, and 
his joy at the release of the people from the thralldom of Democ- 
racy into which they had fallen: 

" It would be peculiarly improper to omit, in this first official 
act, my fervent supplication to that Almighty Being who rules 
over the universe, who presides in the councils of nations, and 
whose providential aid can supply every human defect, that His 
benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the 
people of the United States a government instituted by themselves 
for these essential purposes." 

JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY. 

Nor will it be out of place to advert here to Thomas Jefferson, 
who has been claimed by modern Democrats as the Father of 
Democracy in this country, and to say that he never was a Dem- 
ocrat in the meaning, spirit or practice of Democracy in this coun- 
try. His biographer says: " He was a Republican and a philan- 
thropist.'' And again, that " the term "Democrat" was seldom 
used or countenanced by Jefferson." And in his first inaugural ad- 
dress he said, " We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists "— 
meaning by the term Federalists, the party of Washington and 
Adams. And it is well known that he always repelled the term 
Democracy, as applicable to his party, and that his whole admin- 
istration of eight years was as far from the principles and practice 
of Democracy as that of any other President up to the time of 
Jackson. 

THE DAYS OF THE ODD CONFEDERATION. 

But let us return to the days of the Confederation. If there ever 
was a well-marked case in our country, in which the Almighty 
Being caused the wrath of man to praise Him, and where sin and 
wickedness abounded, grace and virtue should much more abound, 
it was the overruling of the sin and madness of the Democracy, 
after the Revolutionary war, in bringing about the formation and 
ratification of the Constitution of the United States ; for it was on 
account of the anarchical state of affairs that the patriotic leaders 
were enabled to bring the great charter of American liberty into 
existence. After six or seven years of this anarchical condition, 
and an animated discussion, through the public prints, by Wash- 
ington and Franklin, Madison and Hamilton, and a few others, 
the people were aroused to the necessity and importance of a 
strong, national government ; and it was through the people, thus 
suffering and thus aroused, that the Democratic State govern- 
ments were induced or driven to appoint delegates to a National 
Convention, to meet in Philadelphia on the 14th of June, 1787, to 
form a new Constitution. To say that the most enlightened, in- 
telligent, and honest portion of our forefathers were not always 
convinced of the necessity of a strong, national government, in 
the place of the miserable, State-sovereignty Confederation, is to 
charge them with stupidity and a want of common sense. But 
the question was : how the ignorant and vicious masses were to 
be brought to approve of such a plan, and hence the fearful ordeal 
of Democratic anarchy, poverty, and distress furnished the means 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 15 

I 

of overcoming this difficulty, as well as the means of inducing the 
State governments to appoint delegates to the Convention. 

THE PROCEEDINGS BOTH OF THE STATE GOVERNMENTS AND OP THE 
CONVENTION AFTER IT HAD ASSEMBLED. 

In appointing the delegates, these State governments made it a 
condition, anti-democratic as it may seem, that the work of the 
delegates, when assembled, should be confined to a revision of the 
old Articles of Confederation, and that whatever alterations tbey 
might make should be referred, not to the people, but to the same 
Democratic State governments, for ratification or rejection. And 
again, in order that these alterations might not have too much 
popularity and weight with the people, and in order that the Dem- 
ocratic party might not have to shoulder the responsibility of such 
an attempted innovation, these governments appointed, mainly, 
such men as the Democracy of this day would call "old fogies," 
"shelved statesmen," or men who had outlived their day, and 
were behind the times. And thus it happened, that such men as 
Washington, Franklin, Madison and Hamilton, were made dele- 
gates ; some seven or eight of the Convention were men who had 
been in the old revolutionary Congress eleven years before and 
signed*the Declaration of Independence, and, as God would have 
it, the Convention was mainly composed of men who had never 
been Democrats in name, or spirit, and dreaded both as the sailors 
of the East dread the simoon, as travelers on the Sahara the 
sirocco, or as our Western pioneers did the prairie fires. And as 
tributary to this great and providential end, it should be mentioned 
that several delegates, who were deeply tinctured with the Demo- 
cratic mania, declined to attend the Convention, and several more 
left it before its work was completed, or declined to affix their 
names thereunto. Among the first who declined to attend was 
Patrick Henry, the great Virginia orator, who also exerted his 
powerful eloquence to defeat the ratification of the instrument in 
the Virginia convention. But he lived to repent of his mistake, 
and pronounce it "the greatest and best charter of liberty ever de- 
vised by man." And here, too, we must mention that the little 
state of Rhode Island, whose Democracy had bloomed, and ripened 
into one of its legitimate results, namely an oligarchy, or a regency, 
as it was called, refused to appoint any delegates, and for three 
years thereafter, declined to have any thing to do with such an 
anti-democratic institution, as the new Constitution, until the Union 
thereby formed was about to put its foot on its little Democratic 
neck. And hence it came to pass, that there was not a dozen gen- 
uine Democrats found in the Convention, and such as suffered 
themselves to be called Democrats, did so for the purpose of secur- 
ing the final ratification of this work by the people. Nor had any 
one up to that time undertaken to explain the wide difference be- 
tween a Democratic party in power, and a Republican party or 
form of government, or a government by the people, under safe 
forms and regulations, such as the Constitution was intended to 
establish. 

With the Convention thus providentially composed and contain- 
ing, probably, more candor and honesty of purpose, more true 
patriotism and moral worth, more true statesmanship and know- 
ledge of the dispositions, wants and interests of the American peo- 
ple than any other body of men that could possibly have been assem- 

bed they proceeded to their work ; in doing so they took the Demo- 



16 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

cratic bull by the horns, they took the ship of State by the helm, 
and held it with a firm grasp until it was moored In a safe harbor, 
and the freedom, safety and independence of their country was 
fully established. 

FURTHER PROCEEDINGS OP THE CONVENTION. 

The first great act after the Convention was organized was to de- 
cide whether the Articles of Confederation should be amended, or 
a new Constitution prepared. This, after an exhausting discussion, 
was decided in favor of an entirely new instrument, the instruc- 
tions of the State governments to the contrary notwithstanding. 
The next question of importance was as to whether the Constitution, 
when prepared, should be referred back to the .State governments, 
or to the people of the States, and the country at large, for ratifi- 
cation. This, after repeated debates, was decided in favor of the 
people. The next great and all-absorbing question was, should the 
Convention put forth a thorough and complete, supreme and na- 
tional government, or simply a Confederation of States. Upon 
this question, justice and truth compel us to say that there was 
but little controversy, the Convention substituting in place of the 
term "national Constitution," the term, "Constitution of the 
United States," as a grammatical convenience, both to ttye Con- 
vention and the people at large. And thus it came to pass that 
the Convention took the Democratic State governments by the 
horns, and the ship of State into their own hands, and navigated 
it through Democratic breakers, amid Democratic threats and rav- 
ings, into a safe harbor, where the people, with a great shout, as in 
the "City of Brotherly Love," adorned it with flags, and placed upon 
it their own seal of approbation, and celebrated the occasion with 
thousands of artizans plying their trades, and with banners and 
trumpets and drums and cannon. And, what was still more im- 
portant and glorious, this great event, this great revolution, as be- 
fore remarked, laid cold the Democratic party, and buried it out 
of sight for the next forty years. 

THE GREkT CHARTER ESTABLISHED. 

It is'true that for some time after the new Constitution had been 
made public, all sorts of threats, and all sorts of evil predictions of 
civil strife were put forth by the Democracy, in case the plan was 
not abandoned, and several of the large States, strongly Demo- 
cratic, held back, and refused to appoint elections for the people to 
vote upon it, until public opinion forced them to act. Virginia 
and New York are notable in this respect, and it was only through 
the Herculean efforts of James Madison in one, and Alexander 
Hamilton in the other, that those two States were carried for the 
Constitution by small majorities. But when the votes of the States, 
which were nearly unanimous, were counted, which were Dela- 
ware, Georgia, New Hampshire, South Carolina and some others, 
the majority for the Constitution was found to be overwhelming, 
or so large as to put it on an unquestionable and impregnable basis, 
to the great joy, not only of the people of the United States, but 
of the whole world ; so that even the celebrated William Paley, 
the author of Moral and Political Philosophy, and the upholder of 
British royalty and aristocracy, also eulogized the American Con- 
stitution as a great work, and its authors as great men and true 
patriots. And, indeed, such were its provisions, and such were Its 
sound republican principles and guarantees for human rights and 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. IT 

liberties— or, in other words, so completely was it understood to 
embrace those great sentiments contained in the Declaration of 
Independence, " that all men are created equal: that they are en- 
dowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among 
these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ; that to secure 
these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their 
just powers from the consent of the governed," that all parties 
soon settled down under its refreshing shade. But the Democratic 
party of those days, which had served no other purpose but to dis- 
tract and tear down, but to produce anarchy, disorder and distress, 
was eventually not only abandoned by the people as a snare and 
a delusion, but the very word, the very name of Democracy, 
became utterly odious for many years thereafter — so odious, in 
fact, that when Jefferson, some six or eight years thereafter, got 
up his party, and called it the Republican party, he and his parti- 
sans repelled with scorn and contempt the term Democracy, when 
applied to them by the Federalists. 

REFLECTIONS. 

It may also be mentioned, before closing this chapter, that 
in the discussions in the Constitutional Convention on the ques- 
question of electing the lower House of Congress by the people, or 
by the State governments, the then Democratic party and its out- 
rages seem to have furnished the only obstacles and arguments 
against the election of members of Congress by the people. On 
this point, Elbridge Gerry said : " They (the Democrats) do not 
want virtue, but are the dupes of pretended patriots.'' And, again, 
"It would seem to be a maxim of Democracy to starve the public 
servants; and still again, " In his State he thought Democracy the 
worst of all political evils." Edmund Randolph, who had been 
elected to the Governorship of Virginia, and sent to the Constitu- 
tional Convention by the Legislature, deplored " the turbulence 
and follies of Democracy." Mr. Madison also, who was then 
counted a Democrat, complained of " the oppression and injustice 
, experienced from the Democracy.'' Mr. Mason, another Demo- 
cratic delegate from Virginia, who refused to sign the Constitution, 
"admitted the danger of Democracy.'' Alexander Hamilton, 
although in favor of the election of the lower House by the people, 
said he " was alarmed by the amazing violence and turbulence of 
the Democratic spirit." And thus it came to pass, through the 
providence of God, that the word, the name, and the spirit of 
Democracy, which had produced nothing but violence, anarchy, 
distress and poverty throughout the land, were just enough re- 
strained to allow the patriotic Convention to provide for the great 
elections of the lower House, and the President of the nation, by 
the people, in order that the people might approve their great 
work, and, on the other hand, that il the amazing violence and 
turbulence of Democracy " might so alarm the people as to induce 
them to ratify, almost unanimously, the great charter of the 
Union, justice, domestic tranquillity, common defense and general 
welfare, and thereby secure the blessings of liberty to themselves 
and their posterity. 

MODERN DEMOCRACY. 

Dem. I suppose this ends your examination of the Democracy 
of the Revolutionary period. But without stopping to criticise your 
3 



18 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

remarks, I am anxious to hear what you have to say about the 
more modern Democratic party. 

Rep. But before doing this, let us have a few words touching 
the events and the progress of our country during the forty or 
more years after the adoption of the Constitution. On the adop- 
tion of this great charter, and the reconstruction of the govern- 
ment under it, in 1789, as before remarked, Democracy, as a party, 
disappeared, except so far as the Constitutional, alias the Federal 
party, or the party of Washington and Adams, applied the name 
of Democracy to the JefYersonian, alias the Republican party, as a 
term of reproach. In the absence, and upon the ruins, of the old 
Democratic party, the new Constitution and the reconstructed 
government went into operation, and the great experiment of 
" testing the plan '' was to take place. But what demanded still 
more patriotism, and a vast amount of labor, wisdom and forecast, 
was the adoption of the many measures and laws required by the 
internal and external affairs of a young and growing nation. 
Among these great measures were the means of raising revenue 
and the construction of a financial system for the government, a 
medium of exchange for the people, the post-office department, 
an army, and a navy. In a word, all the vast enginery of a com- 
plete national government had to be constructed and put in oper- 
ation. This was all done, and well done, by the fathers without 
the aid or interference of the Democratic party. Nor was it long 
before the young govornment had to contend with insurrections 
and threatened insurrections springing from the smouldering em- 
bers of the then defunct Democratic party. It also had Indian 
wars on its hands and threatening troubles with Spain. It also had 
a war, or a difficulty, if possible, worse than a war, with France, 
its old ally. And all this took place in the first few years under 
the new Constitution, and all was surmounted and the integrity 
of the government preserved, without the aid or interference of the 
Democratic party. And here, too, it should be mentioned, that 
out of this difficulty with France, and the audacious and insulting 
interference of the French Democratic party of that day with the 
rights and prerogatives of our people, grew " the alien and sedition 
laws " on the part of our government for its own protection, and 
of these came the seditious, treasonable State sovereignty Ken- 
tucky resolutions, a shred of the former Democratic plague, but 
prepared by Jefierson, as we must now charitably suppose, for 
partisan purposes only, but which, nevertheless, convulsed the 
country from centre to circumference, and came very near destroy- 
ing the Constitution and the Union, and which resolutions would 
probably have carried the people much farther into anarchy had 
not God put it into the head of Jefferson and his partisans to dis- 
card the term Democracy as a party name, and call themselves 
Republicans. But so it was — all these difficulties, all these dark 
and threatening clouds were dispelled, and the ship of State 
brought once more into calm waters in the absence of a Demo- 
cratic party. 

During the first twenty-five years under the Constitution, the 
entire civilized world was convulsed with wars, and the French 
Revolution under the name and reign of a Democratic Party had 
taken place, and out of its flood and seas of blood, the despot 
Napoleon Bonaparte had arisen, as the legitimate fruit of Democ- 
racy, to be the scourge of mankind; but like a threatening comet he 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 19 

was already receding from the blood-stained horizon. Amid these 
throes of human society and governments, our country was drag- 
ged or driven into a war with Great Britain, out of all of which, 
our good ship of State, under our wise Constitution, war* again 
brought into calm waters, in the absence of the frightful visage of 
a Democratic party in our midst. But during the forty years or 
more of exemption from such a scourge, a sound and practical 
paper currency, under the then only known plan for such a cur- 
rency, had been built up, giving great aid and encouragement to 
iudustry, commerce and enterprise. A system of encouragement 
and protection to home manufactures, by means of a tariff on im- 
ports had also been established, and all internal taxes had been 
repealed. In addition to these achievements, a system of river, 
harbor, and other internal improvements, with an eye to neces- 
sary defences, such as all civilized people demand of their govern- 
ment, was brought into practical and potential operation. And 
in the midst, and in addition to all these, a large number of trea- 
tises had been concluded with foreign nations, to the great advan- 
tage and benefit of the American people, as well as a vast in- 
crease of their wealth and contentment. In addition to all these, 
hundreds of laws, such as all civilized people demand from their 
government, had been enacted, and put in operation to the great 
honor and glory of the nation. In truth, the great charter of 
American ^liberty, freedom, rights, unity and greatness, had 
come to be loved and revered as no other government and Consti- 
tution w T ere loved and revered upon the face of the earth. But in 
an evil hour, in cloisters of darkness, there was sprung upon the 
country, another Democratic Party, which like all other Demo- 
cratic parties, soon ripped up the great measures, and the great 
policies of the fathers, and soon thereafter plunged the people into 
confusion and an ocean of fratricidal strife. It is the history and 
the propensities of this iniquitous organization we must now 
proceed to sketch. 

OTHER INSTINCTS OF DEMOCRACY. 

But before sketching the history of modern Democracy, let us 
analyze and investigate a little further, the nature and instincts of 
a so-called Democratic government, and a Democratic party ; , 
also that of a Republican form of government and a Republican 
party. And in attempting to do this, I am not unaware that the 
word Democratic, and the word Republican, are used synonymous- 
ly and indiscriminately by good writers. But notwithstanding 
this practice, there is, unquestionably, a wide and radical difference 
between a so-called Democratic form of government and a Demo- 
cratic party, and a Republican form of government, and a Repub- 
lican party, both in the abstract and concrete, and in theory, and 
in practice, spirit and results. A purely Democratic form of gov- 
ernment, if, indeed, such a form can exist, for a single year in any 
civilized community, means, or comes to mean, in the minds of, 
its adherents, a government where its entire polity and strength 
are lodged in, and dependent upon, the will and caprice of the peo- 
ple, whenever or wherever expressed, and therefore liable to be- 
radically changed, or revolutionized from month to month, or at 
the longest, from year to year, and also liable, as experience has 
shown, to have the entire power of the government concentrated 
in the hands of a single person at any moment. And in truth,. 



20 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

genuine Democracy, if it tends to keep up a government at all, 
rather than plunge the people into anarchy, knows, and can know 
no other means than that of a single chief and brutal force to carry 
out its will, as was the case under Cromwell, and with the so-called 
Democratic government of France, during the H'reneb Revolution, 
which had*a new chief about once every year, ending in the his- 
toric Roberspierre, and the Reign of Terror. No laws, or institu- 
tions, human or divine, however just, and pure, are, or can be se- 
cure in the presence of such a government or such a party. Where* 
as a purely Republican or representative form of government means 
a government with certain fundamental and fixed laws, customs, 
and forms, which cannot be overridden, or abolished, without a 
radical revolution and the breaking up of society itself. 

A Democratic party, as a matter of course, partakes of its 
ideal and theory of a Democratic government— that is to say, a 
government exclusively by the people, in their primary condition. 
And that is to say, again, where every man is a sovereign by vir- 
tue of his natural rights, and is entitled to do as he pleases in all 
thiugs, and that the party being the party of the people, it must 
be right, and that everybody who is not a Democrat is bound to 
yield to its behests, or the voice of the noisy multitude, whenever 
and wherever expressed, and however absurd and revolutionary 
that may be, as was fully demonstrated in the aforesaid French 
revolution. Then, too, any party calling itself the Democracy 
claims, in the end, to be the law. "We are the law, said the 
French Democracy, " and acted, as we have said, upon that prin- 
ciple; and even Thomas H. Benton, the "Jupiter tonans " of De- 
mocracy in this country, once said " the Democracy had tri- 
umphed over the Constitution," and had become a law unto itself, 
until it c;>,rried the nation into an insane and disastrous civil war, as 
all Democratic parties soon do when in full power, Its nature and 
practice is to assume that a Democratic party can do no wrong, 
and that whatever it does, or may be done in its name, must be 
right, even to the overthrow of the law, and the government itself. 
Such a party, as a matter of course, has no conscience, no moral 
principles outside of itself, or according to the understanding of 
the balance of mankind ; and adopts for itself the motto, " The 
voice of the people is the voice of God,'' which effectually ex- 
cludes all outside influence, except that of force, and carries with 
it the ignorant and the depraved, the vile and the ambitious, until 
its doctrines permeate and contaminate its adherents with this 
false theory, and incites them to believe that what is done by the 
party, or in the name of the party, must be right, whether it be 
murder, theft, riot, ku-kluxism, bull-dozing, ballot-box stuffing, or 
false counting of votes, such as is practised in the name of Democ- 
racy in New York City, and in many parts of the Southern States, 
without a sign of any injury to the party itself. This may seem 
to be a sharp and harsh analysis of a Democratic party, but upon 
no other grounds or theory can we account for the stupendous 
frauds and crimes committed in its name and under its sanction, 
while it holds its own as an organization. That these ever have 
been, and still are, the characteristics and fruits of the present 
Democratic party of our country, and form the true characteris- 
tics of any party bearing the name of Democracy, will more fully 
appear as we analyze its history and acts during the past forty 
years. 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 21 

DEMOCRACY AND ELECTIONS. 

And, again, a Democratic party is naturally and instinctively 
opposed to all laws and safeguards, counted by the balance of the 
world as necessary to fair and honest elections. Its entire history 
shows that it regards all such as restraints and encroachments 
upon Democratic rights and liberty. Liberty, with it, is what 
other people call license, and lawlessness ; and it is doubtful if a 
Democratic party ever voluntarily enacted, or assisted in enacting, 
an election law or formula. But it is certain, the great struggle — 
the great fight — on the part of all other parties, and at every poll- 
ing place in this broad land, has been to keep the Democracy from 
casting illegal and fraudulent votes, and cheating in the count and 
returns. No sooner had the present Democratic party obtained 
power in our National government than it became dissatisfied 
with the naturalization laws, which had already been reduced 
from fourteen to five years, for foreigners to remain in the country 
before voting and holding office, and they began to agitate for their 
total annihilation. This being found a difficult matter, the De- 
mocracy proceeded, or parties under it proceeded, to issue thous- 
ands upon thousands of naturalization papers to foreigners, who 
had not been in the country that length of time ; and, in several 
cases, just before elections, they sent naturalization papers to for- 
eign lands, to be handed to emigrants before embarking, with 
printed directions how and where to vote the Democratic ticket 
on their arrival in this country ; and thus Democracy not only 
violated the laws of the land, but contaminated the incoming citi- 
zens with the crime of perjury, and essayed to destroy the chief 
corner-stone of a representative government by the most infamous 
of crimes. 

DEMOCRACY DESTITUTE OF MORAL PRINCIPLES. 

And here it may be remarked, that under the influence and 
power of such sentiments and practices, and from the want of 
conscience and moral sense, the party has corruptly and long held 
sway in the great State of New York, and especially in the great 
emporium of American commerce; also, its head-centre for the 
whole Democratic party has often counted and returned more 
votes for its ticket than there were men, women and children in 
the wards, and elected, or claimed to have elected, Tweed, the 
champion thief of the world, to the State Senate by more than ten 
thousand majority, after it had been shown that he and his accom- 
plices had plundered the city treasury of more than twenty mil- 
lions of dollars. Verily, there must be something thoroughly and 
fearfully contaminating in the word Democracy, as a party name. 
And, surely, no people, however highly civilized and Christian- 
ized, can long stand out against the assaults of so corrupt an 
organization. No wonder men are heard to cr3 T out, monarchy or 
despotism would be a relief from such a curse and such a scourage ! 
And what a mockery of a representative government is such an 
organization ! 

REPUBLICAN INSTINCTS. 

But to leave this record for a moment, a Republican party, or 
indeed any party, which does not imply by its name, anarchy or 
revolution, naturally and instinctively takes its color and character- 
istics from the kind of government it aims to establish and per- 



22 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

petuate, the same as a monarchical party would naturally put on 
royal airs, and present royal sentiments for the consideration of 
others. In a word, a Republican party is compelled to recognize, 
as binding, certain fundamental laws, forms and usages, and the 
existence and dignity of functionaries appointed according to 
these laws and formulas. It also recognizes a moral obligation to 
respect and obey them, just the same as a Democratic party recog- 
nizes its obligation to respect and obey certain traditions of the 
party, and disregards all rules and obstacles that obstruct the on'- 
ward march of its will, or time-honored principle of "rule or ruin. ' 
Again, a Republican party appeals to, and must of necessity appeal 
to the reason, intelligence and moral sense of the people, rather than 
to their passions and prejudices. And it must of necessity look to 
and guard with all its influence and power, the sanctity of the elec- 
tive franchise and honesty in casting and counting votes. To this 
end it has always sought to enact suitable rules, stringent and 
effective laws for the purpose, and has, in truth, in several coun- 
tries, States and cities, carried the ballot-box Code almost to per- 
fection and thereby secured honest, or nearly honest, elections. 
While on the other hand, the Democracy, in several, if not in all 
cases, when it has had full sway, has not only failed to do this, 
but has lowered the elections to a tragic mockery. This is the 
case at the present time in nearly all the Southern States, and is 
too well known to require specific proof. 

THE COn TB AST. 

A Republican party, of necessity, seeks to embrace in its fold 
and fellowship the virtue, intelligence and learning of the land. 
as did the old Whig party ; while a Democratic party seeks, and 
ever has sought the ignorant and the depraved, as its principal 
support, and for the purpose of securing this has never scrupled 
to drive the learned, the virtuous and patriotic from places of 
trust. It even prohibits and prescribes its own leaders from ex- 
pressing honest views and sound doctrines, as we shall be able to 
demonstrate before we get through. A Republican party pre- 
supposes a goodly shareof virtue, wisdom and statesmanship in 
past generations, and recognizes many laws and customs worthy 
of honor and preservation.. It also looks into the future, and 
has ever been ready to submit to some hardships and danger of its 
popularity, for the sake of the harvest to be reaped by posterity. 
Such a party, it is true, may sometimes err and adopt wrong meas- 
ures, but its composition and instincts are such as any people can 
afford to trust, and without which no free government can have 
safety for a single year. Or, to express the same in other words, 
when such a party ceases to have sway, the ignorant and the de- 
praved, the vile and the ambitious, soon drive the ship of State 
upon breakers, or convert it into a craft for thieve3 and pirates. 

REPUBLICANISM AND DEMOCRACY ON EDUCATION AND MORALS. 

Lastly, a Republican party, or any other party, whose name 
does not imply insurrection, or disorder, teaches the people to love 
and respect their government; to love and respect it, not only as 
a police power to punish and suppress crime, but as a power for 
mutual aid, and protection, a power to promote and encourage 
inter-communication, commercial and otherwise, a power to assist 
in the elevation and education of the rising generations in morality, 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 23 

intelligence, and productive industry, and last, but not least, in 
the protection of human rights, and rational liberty. Whereas a 
Democratic party from its name, its composition, and instincts, 
teaches the people to hate and contemn government, as a usurpa- 
tion, and a contrivance for the benefit of the rich, and the oppres- 
sion of the poor, and laboring classes, and herein we have a dis- 
tinct view of Pandora's box, from which flow riots, insurrections, 
and the chief danger to all governments. And hence, too, we have 
a view of the fact, that under no form of government, except that 
of a purely elective one, can a Democratic organization be tolerated 
for a single day, and the fact also that the anarchical and danger- 
ous elements, when organized under a monarchy, take the name 
of Chartists, Socialists, or some other comparatively harmless 
•cognomen. And hence comes, too, the great question, can a purely 
elective and just government be maintained in the presence of a 
party bearing the name of Democracy? The judgment and ex- 
perience of the world is that it cannot, and that Democracy, as a 
party name, and organization, must be overthrown, or it will over- 
throw the government, whatever its character may be, and turn, 
and overturn until anarchy reigns. And again, who can doubt, 
that when a Democratic party changes its name even to that of 
Chartism, Socialism, or even Nihilism, its dangerous instincts 
and sting become blunted, and comparatively harmless, or when 
it is changed to that of Conservatism, or Republicanism, as was 
the case in Jefferson's day, its course and conduct soon undergo a 
transformation for the better ? Or who can doubt that if the Re- 
publican party of to-day should take the name of Democracy, and 
Democracy should take the name of Republicanism, if such a 
thing could happen, that the character and conduct of both par- 
ties would soon undergo radical changes, one for the better, and 
the other for the worse ? Or who can believe that the recent in- 
sane and wicked civil war could have been set on foot under any 
other name, or organization, but that of Democracy ? Or, who 
can for a moment believe that any other party on the face of the 
«arth than that of Democracy, would have been guilty of the re- 
cent, audacious and insane attempt to starve the government of 
the country to death, unless it would abandon all hope and efforts 
to protect the elective franchise from the accustomed frauds of 
Democracy upon this fundamental principle of liberty and self- 
government? 

Lastly, a Republican or any other party which does not suggest 
by its name anarchy or revolution, usually inclines to promote 
sobriety and temperance among the people, but a Democratic 
party has ever been found allying itself with dram-shops and in- 
toxicating liquors, and fighting against all laws and moral re- 
straints upon these terrible evils. I speak of the party as a whole. 
In the half million or more of these dens of iniquity and disorder 
in this country, known as dram-shops, Democracy has found its 
stronghold and most reliable support. Nor is it to be denied that 
this party, as a whole, is instinctively opposed to moral and civi- 
lizing enterprises, and is but too often found pulling down what 
other parties have built up, and spreading moral pestilence where 
righteousness and truth have achieved their choicest victories. 
Power and plunder is its passion, principle is its foot-ball, ambition 
its banner, and its army of reserve is ignorance and depravity. Its 



24 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

province is anarchy, is mission is revolution upon revolution, with 
grog-shops and other dens of iniquity for its recruiting stations. 

In the next chapter, the origin, history, practical operations and 
results of the present Democratic party will be presented, and evi- 
dence afforded that under no other party, name or organization, 
could slavery have been foisted into a false position before the 
world, or the great secession war have been put on foot. 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED; 

OB, 

A CONVERSATION BETWEEN A REPUBLICAN 
AND A MODEEATE DEMOCRAT. 



CHAPTER II. 

John Quincy Adams, who had been a decided supporter of the 
administration of Thomas Jefferson, and who had held the high- 
est appointments under President Madison and President Monroe, 
was inaugurated President of the United States in 1825. He was 
a man of great natural abilities, extensive learning, pure morals, 
and stood at the time at the head of all his countrymen, both in 
experience and reputation, as a diplomatist and statesman. He 
was fifty-seven years old at the time, and probably understood the 
laws, the Constitution in all its bearings, and the needs of his 
country better than any man of his age. It was his fortune, 
or his misfortune, to have his administration more violently and 
unjustly assailed than that of any other President, yet he con- 
ducted it so completely in accordance with his personal character 
and professions, as well as the interest of his country, that he left 
it as a bright and glorious example of honesty, purity and states- 
manlike ability, and probably under no administration have the 
people of the United States ever enjoyed more prosperity or solid 
happiness. 

His chief competitor for the presidency was Andrew Jackson, 
a man of the same age with himself. Jackson was a man of lim- 
ited education, and almost entirely destitute of experience in 
state affairs. He had a fiery temper, and was bellicose in his dis 
position and habits. He had been a brave and successful Indian 
fighter, and had gained high reputation, as the American 
commander at the battle of New Orleans, on the 8th of January 
1814. When in power he was despotic, tyrannical and vindictive, 
and had no mercy on those who offended him, or interfered with 
his views or plans. He hung several men for slight offenses. He 
even sought to use violence upon members of Congress, who 
thought proper to criticise and condemn his conduct as a military 
commander. Nor did he cease to denounce Such as opposed him, 
or questioned his authority, to the end of his days. In 1828 he 
was elected President of the United States, by the popular vote, 
and was inaugurated in 1829. His party was called the Jackson 



26 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

party ; but soon thereafter took the name of the Democratic Party, 
and this was the beginning of the present Democratic Party. And 
now, as if by some inscrutable design of Providence, for some in- 
scrutable purpose, in his elevation, he proved to be the most 
apt and congenial leader for such a party, and that portion of 
mankind which abhor civil government and laws, that could 
have been found in all the broad land. And although he possess- 
ed many excellent traits, his administration proved to be every 
way in conformity with his personal faults and disposition, that 
is to say, despotic, tyrannical, and vindictive, and he ended his 
career as a statesman in the midst of fearful distress and confu- 
sion among the people. 

EVIL COUNSELLORS. 

Dem. I confess, Mr. R. that you give a sharp analysis and 
criticism of Democracy. But the truth and soundness of vour 
whole argument, I confess, turns upon the question, does or does 
not a Democratic Party absorb more than its pioportional share of 
the dangerous and vicious elements of society, or in other words, 
does a Democratic party depend more upon the ignorance and de- 
pravity among the people than upon virtue and intelligence for 
its strength and support? If these can be answered in the affirm- 
ative, then, indeed, the word Democracy ought to be dreaded and 
discarded, as a party name. For I agree with you that the safety 
and success of any form of government depends entirely, under 
God, in having the most virtuous and patriotic, the most prudent 
and wise portion of the people in the ascendent. 

Where the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but 
when " the wicked bear rule the people mourn ;" and in a purely 
representative form of government, this rule, if possible, is more 
essential to the peace, and prosperity of the people than any other 
form. But I cannot regard General Jackson as a depraved man, 
or any other than a great and true patriot, liable, of course, like 
other men to commit many errors. 

Rep. In this you are right, and the trouble in his administra- 
tion arose mainly from the fact that he fell into the hands of art- 
ful and unscrupulous advisers, whose ambition and avarice pre- 
dominated over their patriotism ; second, that tkese men counted 
and profited more upon his weaknesses and vices than upon his 
virtues and patriotism for the accomplishment of their ends ; and, 
third, the adoption of the word " Democracy v as a party name 
soon filled the wild and dangerous elements of the land with 
hopes of a political saturnalia, and many honest people with Uto- 
pian ideas of political liberty, and wealth, never possibly to be 
realized. And thus these advisers, or, more properly speaking, 
intriguers, in the absence, perhaps, of some good measures or 
policy for their ambition to feed upon, deemed it proper to attack 
and put a stop to all the great policies and institutions which the 
fathers had built up, and soon plunged the country into the inevita- 
ble disorders and confusion, towhich unbridled Democracy in power 
inevitably leads. And it is hard at this day to decide whether the 
depravity of the Democratic party, or the want of experience and 
wisdom on the part of the Chief Magistrate, was the greater cause 
of the disasters which came upon the country. 

As we look back upon the leaders and measures that guided the 
Jackson Democratic party, we are compelled to regard them not 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. m 27 

as the companions, or representatives, of the Revolutionary fath- 
ers, but as innovators and reactionists, and as men permitted by 
an inscrutable Providence to arrest the moral and political progress 
of the nation, or as scourges upon the people for sins they may have 
committed. They were indeed men of great cunning and art, 
and endowed with great fluency of speech, and who seemed 
to regard the government and country as made for them, and 
not themselves for their country. Or, in other words, they seem 
to regard ihemselves as specially appointed to brow-beat and lash 
all sound statesmen out of all places of honor, power and trust, 
and turn the wheels of progress back upon themselves. Their 
reactionary measures commenced, it is true, before Democracy was 
assumed as a party title. But it was the assumption of this name, 
and the noisy crowds it stirred up, and filled with hatred of the 
government, that enabled these reckless leaders to carry on their 
reactionary work of ruin to the end. To illustrate their course, 
during the administration of John Q. Adams, under pretense of 
extravagance and dangerous patronage in the hands of the Presi- 
dent, they raised committees upon committees, and introduced 
measures upon measures into Congress, to hunt out and lop off 
these pretended evils. To this end, Benton, one of their great 
chiefs, introduced no less than six such humbug bills into Con- 
gress at one time. This practice continued throughout the ad- 
ministration of Adams, and the noise and confusion, doubt and 
fear thus raised among the people, may be compared to a hundred 
drays driven rapidly over a paved street, or the whirlwind's thun- 
der and water-spouts, in the Gulf stream, in time of the equinox; 
but all of which in the end proved to be sound and fury, signify- 
ing nothing, or in other words, a base flood of calumny and false- 
hood upon good men and measures, and upon all of which wise and 
prudent people have been compelled to look back as a mockery of 
statesmanship, and the administration of Adams as unsurpassed 
in ability, purity and patriotic devotion. Yet this flood of false 
accusations, and hypocritical noise, was, for some inscrutable pur- 
pose in4hemind of God, allowed to prevail for a whoie genera- 
tion. One of the leaders, when asked what it all meant, and why 
this war was kept up upon Adams and his friends, replied : u The 
administration and the party, although as pure as angels of light, 
had to comedown and give place to other men.*' 

RETROSPECT. 

To have a clear understanding, and perception of the depravity 
of the present Democratic party, in its origin, in its early, as well 
as in its more recent conduct, we must take a historical retrospect 
of the policy and measures of the government, before, and at the 
time, the Democracy came into power. A revenue tariff with pro- 
tection to home industry, a bank of the United States, and a sys- 
tem of internal improvements by the general government, com- 
prised the leading domestic measures and policy 01 the country, 
during the first forty years, under the Constitution. A protective 
tariff, and a bank were both instituted under Washington ; the in- 
ternal improvement system became the settled policy of the gov- 
ernment under President Jefferson. The first bank charter was 
granted in 1791, and expired in 1811. The second bank was char- 
tered in 1816, and expired in 1836, seven years after Jackson's first 
inauguration to the Presidency. Upon the first appearance of 



28 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

Jackson before the public, as a Presidential candidate, these great 
measures of State were all very popular with the people, and 
were considered as settled, beyond material change or reversal. 
Under them, the country had risen to prosperity and happiness. 
These measures having received the sanction of the fathers of the 
government, and all former administrations, their threatened dis- 
turbance and overthrow were, as a matter of course, attended with 
grea: commotion among the people. And now in the light of more 
recent experience, and the virtual restoration of all these measures, 
after much trouble growing out of their disturbance and repeal,*it 
may be counted certain that these measures and this policy, could 
never have been overthrown without the introduction of Democ- 
racy, as a party name, and a Democratic organization, with its 
poisonous breath, and instincts for ripping up and tearing down 
everything venerable and sage. Nor could any body of men, short 
of a set of unscrupulous leaders, frantic for public plunder, have 
been found bold enough to venture upon such a warfare against the 
government, and the best interests of the country. Free from the 
scourge of such a party for forty years, the people, amid all their 
wars and other drawbacks, had enjoyed, under these measures, a 
rapid and prosperous growth. And but for the ignorance and in- 
difference of the people to the dangers of a Democratic party, they 
probably never could have been hoodwinked, and drawn into the 
trouble and distress they were destined to sutler, from the acts of 
this unscrupulous gang of politicians. What old man of to-day 
does not well remember how these great measures, and all the 
able statesmen of the country, were calumniated and reviled by 
these men and their organs, and how they deluded the people, 
year after year, by calling these statesmen oppressors, and virtu- 
ally promising the people, the poor slaves, of course, excepted, that 
"the bottom rails of society should soon be on top." And thus they 
continued to lie and deceive, until utter ruin and destitution came 
upon the country, or rather upon the laboring classes, as a conse- 
quence of their attacks upon these men, and measures ; as it is pro- 
posed to more fully demonstrate, and as every old man well re- 
members. 

RETROSPECT CONTINUED. 

And again, at the time of the Declaration of Independence, the 
colonies owed allegiance to the British crown. But by this act 
their allegiance was transferred to the United States of America 
In the throes, convulsions and struggles that followed, and in the 
absence of a well-settled government, both low demagogues and 
would-be aristocrats, in the several States, began to talk of inde- 
pendent action and State sovereignty, and claimed that each 
State, even little Delaware and Rhode Island, each constituted an 
independent nation, with power to make treaties, and form and 
break alliances, as might best suit the notions and interests of 
those who might happen to be in power. Under this state of 
things the States went on from bad to worse, until the entire coun- 
try appeared to be ready to drop into the depths of barbarism, or 
fall back into the arms of some European power. Thus did State 
sovereignty take its rise in this country, and in connection with 
the Dem cracy of those days, plunged the people for the first time 
into anarchy, poverty and prospective ruin, but from which they 
were rescued by the great charter of liberty, peace and union, 
called the Constitution. It was this same old State sovereignty 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 29 

dogma, with its treasonable visage, that was now revived, and 
seized upon, and elevated by these modern Democratic politicians 
into their chief tenet and time-honored principle. From that day 
to this the Democracy has held to this dogma, as a part of itself, 
and, what is worthy of remark, is the fact, that Jackson, their 
great figure-head, while under the obligations of the Presidential 
oath, did not scruple to glorify this treasonable doctrine as the 
palladium of the Constitution itself, as we shall see before closing 
this chapter. 

In the next place, up to this time slavery had been regarded by 
all parties, all sects, and all civilized communities as a great moral 
and political evil, to be gotten rid of, or abolished, by enlightened 
governments. But no sooner was this Demoratic party fully in- 
stalled in power, as strange as it may seem, compared with its 
professions, it set itself to work to foist slavery upon the world as 
a divine institution. It is safe, therefore, to say fl that no great 
organization, except that of a Democratic party, and no party 
leaders, except the most depraved and reckless, would ever have 
ventured thus to defy and set at naught the moral, political and 
religious sense of mankind. It may, therefore, not be out of place 
to expect, that at the ciose of the first forty years, under the Con- 
stitution of the United States, and the patriotic labors of Washing- 
ton, John Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and John Q. Adams, 
under all of whom wisdom and patriotism predominated over 
selfish ambition — that, under these and their compatriots, all the 
great and necessary measures of a new country and a new govern- 
ment had been instituted, leaving, as it were, only one greatcause 
to receive the encouragement and aid of the government — namely : 
the cause of Education and the moral and intellectualelevationof 
the rising generations— and which has, in part, been done by the 
present Republican party. But, instead of this Jackson Democracy 
thus putting forth its power and influence for this great work, it put 
its foot upon it ; it everywhere scouted it, and directed its entire 
energies, its whole power and influence —nay, the whole power 
and influence of the government itself — to the tearing down and 
up-roooting of the forty years' work of the fathers. Yes, instead* 
of taking hold of this great work, of education and elevation of 
the young,— the honor and glory of our country, —under the inspira- 
tion and guidance of the " State sovereignty " dogma, the identical 
heresy upon which the great rebellion has been worked up, and 
set on foot, its chief energies were directed to the tearing down 
and the up -rooting of the forty years' work and wisdom of the 
fathers, and in attempts to vindicate and strengthen the bands of 
human slavery. 

INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS ASSAILED. 

The first heavy assault of the Jackson Democracy was made 
upon the Internal Improvement system. And, although this 
system has been too much and too thoroughly discussed by the 
ablest minds of the land to call for re-discussion here, it may be 
observed, that the system originated almost simultaneously with 
the government, and took shape as early as 1806, and continued to 
be carried on with caution and success until 1830, embracing the 
administrations of Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and John Q> 
Adams, and greatly aided the industry, commerce and growth of 
the country. The system consisted of government aid in the con* 



30 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

struction of roads and bridges, such as were greatly needed in a 
new country, and could not be constructed by the States or private 
enterprise. 

Secondly, in the construction of canals, the improvement of 
rivers, harbors and other water-courses for the benefit of trade and 
navigation. Now all such and many other Improvements have 
always devolved upon, and been executed or aided by, every 
supreme government that has ever existed over a civilized people, 
and these, in fact, comprise such duties and burdens as no govern- 
ment, whether supreme or subordinate, has ever been able to 
neglect and exist for any length of time among any intelligent 
community. Even the small village, as well as the large city gov- 
ernment, has been compelled to construct sewers, streets, and do 
many other things for the mutual benefit of its constituents, be- 
sides performing police duties and collecting taxes for its own sup- 
port. Such mutual aid- works are and ever have been regarded as 
conspicuous and forcible evidences of civilized arts and good gov- 
ernment. It was such a system of improvements by the general 
government, inaugurated and carried on by a generation of able 
statesmen, that was attacked and sought to'be overthrown as soon 
as this Democratic party found itself in power. Jackson's veto of 
the Maysville Road Bill was dated May 27th, 1830, and comprised 
the first combined assault of the party upon this system, and re- 
sulted in vast mischief to the country, as did most other Demo- 
cratic measures. 

Under ordinary circumstances, and especially in large cities, 
where a Democratic party is in power, but cannot override and 
crush out all enlightened systems of improvements, it goes in for 
heavy taxes upon the rich and well-to-do and heavy expenditures 
in all sorts of employments, offices and sinecures. Thus, when it 
attains to full power in a city or other compact community, its 
policy is to regard the wealthy as sheep to be sheared, or geese to 
be plucked, and the only reason why it does not devour them at 
once is because of the fleece or the golden egg, both of which 
would stop in case of entire confiscation. The Tammany robberies 
of the city of New York, with its $30,000,000 revenue, is a fair ex- 
ample of Democratic treatment and policy. Bat in the case of 
the broad and open country, where large masses of ignorant people 
are found in widely separated sections, and where the interests of 
these sections are various and conflicting, and where large num- 
bers of malcontents and instinctive anarchists and revolutionists 
are found, there the Democratic policy is different. There the 
party resorts to savage and barbaric measures of the uprooting and 
tearing down character, like this attack upon the Internal Im- 
provement System, and such, in fact, as were the attacks upon the 
bank, the tariff, and, in truth, upon everything sacred and vener- 
able against which the ignorant and depraved masses can be ex- 
cited. Not to thus act, not to be thus disposed, on all occasions, 
would, in truth, be undemocratic. To illustrate its general de- 
pravity, no Democratic party in full power ever hesitated for a 
single day to plunge the country into a war, civil or foreign, when 
an opportunity presented itself, unless, indeed, it w T as restrained by 
fear of sudden destruction. Witness the history of the French 
Democracy during the French Revolution, by turns at war with 
every nation in Europe, and how readily our Democracy plunged 
our country into war with Mexico r and our great civil war, with- 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 31 

out any adequate cause. Appeals to the passions and appetites of 
the ignorant and depraved, the anarchical and revolutionary, is 
precisely what Democracy means, what it ever has meant, and 
what it ever will mean, as a party title and organization. 

ANOTHER CAUSE OF ITS HOSTILITY. 

Then again, it was known that Adams and his party had laid 
great stress on the Internal Improvement policy, and that Henry 
Clay, the great orator, statesman, and patriot of bis day, had de- 
livered exhaustive speeches in its advocacy, and that with the 
overthrow of this policy, this great champion of American rights 
would be discredited, and his dreaded influence destroyed. This 
was enough of itself to determine the action and course of the en- 
tire Democratic party, on this or any other great question of state. 
But let us now contemplate for a moment how this Democratic 
opposition worked out. It is true that for a short time, the Inter- 
nal Improvement appropriations were arrested. But owing to 
public opinion being strongly in favor of such improvements, only 
a short time sufficed to revive them ; and instead of the appropria- 
tions being made, each upon its own merits, and the honest con- 
victions of Congress, combinations and cliques of every color were 
found, and what is called "omnibus bills'' and "log-rolling opera- 
tions," carried appropriations through, and as experience has 
shown, hundreds of appropriations were carried by these means; 
and it is well known that scarce one has been without its "fat job^ ; 
as these speculations are called, in the hands of the politicians who 
carried them through. And thus instead of the amounts being 
diminished, they were greatly augmented by the aid of Demo- 
cratic votes, and millions upon millions have been thus squan- 
dered and plundered from the government, without any return or 
benefit to the country at large. All this demoralization and waste 
must be set down as the direct fruit of the Democratic party in the 
very first stages of its existence. 

THE SOUTHERN DEMOCRACY AND THEIR FELO-DE-SE. 

Nor should we neglect, in this connection, to observe some more 
of the fruits of this opposition, especially at the South. The chief 
and most respectable portion of the Democratic party was, as it is 
to-day, found in the Southern States, and the very section, too, 
which had, as it has to-day, the best claim and the most need of 
government aid, in works of Internal Improvement. It is well 
known to all that the chief products of the Southern States were 
then as they are to-day, cotton, tobacco, turpentine, and rice, and 
that the people as they do to-day, draw their chief supplies of meat 
and grain, from the fertile fields of the Western States, but which 
had to be transported mainly by the circuitous routes of New York 
and Louisiana. Besides this, the Southern people were anxious to 
build up ocean emporiums for Western and Foreign commerce. 
Ever since the days of Washington, it had been the fond dream of 
the Southern people to reach those Western plains, by direct roads, 
and canals, and in which enterprises, in fact, they have expended 
vast sums of money. About the time this warfare by the Jackson 
Democracy was commenced against government aid, the railway 
was invented, and introduced into this country, which the Democ- 
racy contended would enable the States and private enterprise to 
cross the Alleghanies with ease ; but not so, as experience soon 



32 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

demonstrated. Georgia and Tennessee did, indeed, after many 
years of strenuous efforts and heavy outlay, open a great national 
route, but not without bringing bankruptcy, or approximate bank- 
ruptcy upon the two States. The great States of Virginia, North 
Carolina, and South Carolina, although making heavy contribu- 
tions to the National Treasury, which they should in part have 
received back in some form of direct benefits, were utterly bank- 
rupted by their unaided efforts to effect these expensive and diffi- 
cult trans-mountain routes, and as yet have hardly succeeded. 
There were during all those times many wise, and patriotic men 
in these States, especially among the old Whigs, who were anxious 
to avail themselves of government aid, such as belonged to the 
South and could be obtained by making the proper demand. Had 
it been done, as these men contended it should be, these lines of 
transportation could have been coustructed in a short time, instead 
of drawing their slow lengths along, as some of them have done 
for forty years, and not yet completed. But these Southern States 
being labelled in front and rear, as solid for Democracy, lifted up 
holy hands, in horror at being contaminated with national ducats, 
or at any thing savoring of internal improvements by the general 
government. The result was, not a diminution of such appropria- 
tions, but that the Eastern and Western States have grown rich by 
the policy, and the Southern States have remained miserably poor 
and scarce of population ; and all for the sake of upholding a po- 
litical party and a political dcgma, which meant then, and mean 
to-day the uprooting and overthrow of all that the fathers have 
done for the glory of the country, whenever and wherever the 
leaders cannot revel ad libitum in public plunder. 

NULLIFICATION. 

The new Democracy having adopted State sovereignty, as its 
chief tenet, and having rolled it as a sweet morsel under its tongue, 
it is not to be counted strange that it soon become anti tariff, anti- 
internal improvement, anti-bank, and in truth opposed to every- 
thing that contributed to the honor and safety of the government 
and the country. It is true that this dogma, on its first essay to 
put itself in practice, that is, under the name and style of nulli- 
fication, was nipped in the bud, "scotched," but not by any 
means "killed" by Jackson's proclamation. This was only epi- 
sodical, and only meant that nullification was premature, and 
that Jackson's authority and dignity had been insulted. For 
State sovereignty grew, and its progeny increased under the fos- 
tering care of the Democratic Party till its number was legion, 
and until it sought to ingulf the whole nation in its dark and 
slimy marshes, as every school boy now knows. 

PROTECTIVE TARIFF. 

There was in Jackson's day, no well defined party which was 
opposed to import duties as a source of national revenue. But the 
point made by the newly fledged Democracy was as to whether in 
levying imports, discriminations in favor of American industry 
and manufactures, as against the industries and manufactures of 
foreign nations, should be kept in view as a distinctive feature of 
the tariff. The Democracy, as a matter of course, took the nega- 
tive side of this question, and held that discrimination and pro* 
tection were contrary to the Constitution, and wrong in practice. 
In its first great battle upon this point, with nullification as its 
war club, it drove the protectionists to the wall, in what was call* 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 66 

ed the Clay Compromise Bill of 1833, and forced the protectionists 
to abandon their favorite theory. And in this way was laid one 
of the causes of the financial catastrophe, and the unparalleled 
bankruptcy of the people from 1837 to 1842, as we shall more clear- 
ly understand as we proceed. But it is not out of place here to 
say by way of defence of this theory, that the very first tariff bill 
passed by the Congress, and which took place in the first session of 
Congress after the adoption of the Constitution, recognized the 
protective principle as sound and wise, and that every tariff bill 
passed up to the Clay Compromise of 1833 also recognized the pro- 
tective principle as constitutional, sound in theory, and in accord- 
ance with the necessities of a new and growing nation. But just 
and sound as it may appear, it was upon this policy of discrimina- 
tion that the first attempted practical application of the dogma 
of State sovereignty was made by the solid Democratic State of 
South Carolina, which was thwarted, as before stated. But here 
the question arises, did nullification, as the first attempted appli- 
cation of State sovereignty, grow out of the protective principle in 
the tariff, or did it spring from the diabolical instincts of a portion 
of mankind for riot, insurrection and rebellion, ever ready to be 
kindled into a flame by the presence and full sway of a Demo- 
cratic organization, and the unscrupulous leaders that such a party 
never fails to produce? The vast injury that came to the country, 
North and South. East and West, from the abandonment of pro- 
tection, can never be estimated by the ability of man ; nor would 
any political party that ever existed have danced and shouted 
over such calamities to the people but a State sovereignty Demo- 
cratic pary, 

WARFARE UPON THE BANK. 

But before following out the effects of Democratic warfare upon 
the protective tariff, we must speak of its warfare upon the Bank 
of the United States. For these two great measures went hand in 
hand in promoting the growth and prosperity of the people, and 
consequently their simultaneous overthrow greatly augmented 
the fearful crash and calamities which commenced in 1837. Paper 
currency in some shape had for more than two hundred years been 
used as a medium of exchange in all commercial communities. 
And although in all such countries, it had been a great source of 
fraud and losses to the people, they had nevertheless still adhered 
to it, and demanded its authorization and encouragement by the 
government. The plans and devices of statesmen to render the 
notes safe and secure, were many and various. But eventually all 
the nations of Europe seem to have settled down in the opinion, 
that the government itself must either issue its own notes as a 
currency, or authorize and guarantee the soundness, and final re- 
demption in specie of the notes of corporations. In accordance 
with this opinion, England, France, and other European nations 
chartered national banks, in which they co-operated in the subscrip- 
tion of shares, government deposit, and otherwise, for the safety and 
security of the currency notes. In accordance with these examples, 
which had existed for ages, and had proved to be highly valuable, 
and popular, and indeed comprised great features in the machinery 
of modern civilization, a bank of the United States was chartered 
first under Washington ; and again one was chartered under James 
Madison, which was to continue till 1836. 



34 DEMOCKACY EXAMINED. 

At that time, and in fact up to the time that our present national 
banking system was inaugurated, one national bank comprised 
the only known plan, or instrumentality, by which a safe currency 
could be furnished to the people for commercial purposes. There- 
tore, after nearly forty years trial of this instrumentality, it is 
well-known that the commercial interests and people of theUnited 
States were well satisfied with it. It is true r private banks and cor- 
porations had been set on foot, which furnished a currency for the 
people near the points of their localities, but there was no device 
known in those days except a national bank which could fully 
supply the demand for a paper currency, and the wants of com- 
merce at large. The Bank of the United States with its branches 
met I his demand to the fullest extent r and gave to the people and 
to commerce, as before remarked, the highest satisfaction and 
great benefits. And it is worthy of remark that through its aid 
and influence, during its existence, the country never rose more 
rapidly in wealth and prosperity, and seemed never to have been 
on a safer footing for continued' advancement in industry, manu- 
factures and commerce. And what is still more worthy of note r 
with the introduction, and expansion of steam power and railways, 
which greatly augmented domestic and foreign commerce, this 
national currency was to the body politic of a great country, what 
healthy blood is to the human body, and thus was it regarded by 
the purest and wisest patriots of the day. Nor was there a fear 
nor a suspicion that the bank was unsound or unsafe for the bill- 
aolders, or that its shareholders would be unable to secure a re- 
newal of its charter, when the time should come to require it. 
And here, too, let it be remarked, that in 1830 the Bank had ex- 
tended its branches into every state, and every commercial em- 
porium in the Union, thereby operating for the benefit of trade in 
every part of the country, and promising to root out, and hold in 
check scores and hundred of "wild cat, and swindling concerns' 7 
called banks under state permits, and save people from their rob- 
beries. This bank had in fact become like the Banks of England 
and France to those countries interwoven with almost every legiti- 
mate enterprise and interest of the land. And it was in view of 
these extended relations and interests that the stockholders, the 
government itself holding about one- third of the stock— the private 
stockholders petitioned the government for a new charter. It was 
readily introduced, and passed by both houses of Congress by large 
majorities. 

But it was in the midst of this prosperous and hopeful state of 
affairs that the Democratic orators and organs had been pouring 
upon the Bank and into the ears of the people, and, as for that 
also, into the ears of the President, their accustomed flood of 
sophistry, falsehood and misrepresentation. And, in fact, Jackson 
had, by this time, become fully imbued and intoxicated with the 
spirit of Democracy, and having learned to estimate the ignorance 
and depravity which then lay in reserve among the people, and 
which, experience had demonstrated, could be rallied on any 
point, and for any measure, under the cry of Democracy, or the 
"unterrified", he did not hesitate, but boldly and recklessly 
plunged into the partisan arena, and vetoed the measure as passed 
by the Congress. We say partisan arena, for the astonish ment and 
the indignation produced by this veto, throughout the entire coun- 
try, has probably never been equalled by any document emanating 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 35 

from the hands of a President. We say partisan again, for, be it 
known, that from that day, July 10th, 1832, to the end of Van 
Buren's administration, a period of ten years, the entire talent, 
force and vigor of these administrations, and the entire talent, 
force and vigor of the Democratic party were exerted to convince 
the people that they had no use for a United States Bank, or a 
national paper currency, and that such an institution was dangerous 
co their liberties. Indeed, if all the arguments, logic, sophistrjr, 
falsehood and calumny which were uttered and printed by the 
Democracy against the Bank, and its friends could be collected in 
the District of Columbia, we may suppose it would comprise a 
quantity sufficient to bury the Capitol out of sight. Yet, in answer 
to all this sophistry and trash, the people gave a negative, a flat 
denial, a contradictory reply, in the election of a Whig and Bank 
Congress and a Whig and Bank President, William H. Harrison, 
in 1840. 

But we must go on with the narrative of the warfare. The 
movement for a new charter was four years before the expiration 
of the old one. But, as soon as the veto was over, Jackson and 
his courtiers accused the Bank of insolvency, and all sorts of dis- 
honest motives and conduct, and so incessant were these attacks 
that Congress, after a proper examination, resolved that the Bank 
had been wisely and honestly managed, and that the Government ' 
deposits, amounting at that time to some ten millions of dollars, 
were safe in its custody; yet, in the face and eyes of this action, 
.and a law which required the deposit to be kept in the Bank of the 
United States, Jackson resolved to have them removed on his own 
responsibility, and have them placed in various State banks, at the 
same time advising these State banks to increase their accom- 
modations to the people, and the States to charter, more banks to 
supply the vacuum about to be produced by the overthrow of the 
Bank of the United States. Tnis advice was not only taken, and 
acted up to by the States and the banks, but the entire country was 
soon flooded with all sorts of banks, many of them of the most 
audacious and swindling character. Under this programme the 
remonstrances from all parts of the country were heavy, and the 
excitement great, yet the deposits were wrenched from the Bank 
where they had been legally placed, and placed in what were 
called Jackson's pet banks, which greatly increased the disturb- 
ance of financial and commercial affairs, and which, in fact, at 
that time, 1833, came very near producing a general panic and. 
crash in business affairs. 

Bern. But tell me, Mr. R, did not the Bank of the United. 
States prove insolvent in the end, and thereby justify the action, of 
Jackson and his advisers ? 

Bep. It did indeed prove insolvent several years afterwards, 
under a charter procured from the State of Pennsylvania. But 
you must recollect a moneyed corporation is a very sensitive and 
delicate institution, which may be greatly injured, and sometimes 
destroyed, by the slanderous tongues of a few individuals. But 
this bank had against it the whole power and influence of the Gov- 
ernment of the United States, and the daily outpourings of the 
entire Democratic party, teeming with calumny and falsehood,, 
against it, instead of having, as every sound and healthy institu- 
tion should have and must have, the sympathy and protection of 
the Government to stand and succeed. But I must here give 



36 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

a short sketch of the immediate cause of its failure; although this 
did not and could not effect the correctness of the Bank, nor the 
warfare upon it at the time it took place. The Hank was, and had 
been from from its beginning, in 1816, the fiscal agent and deposi- 
tory for all the Government funds, the same as the Bank of Eng- 
land and the Bank of France were, and still, are the fiscal agents 
and places of deposit for their respective Governments. But no 
sooner was the fearful action above related put into full operation, 
than these new banks of deposit began, one after another, to give 
way or fail to respond to the calls of the Government, as many of 
them were compelled to do, now that the specie had left the coun- 
try. In this fearful crisis, Jackson arbitrarily issued what was 
called his "specie circular," that it to say, an order declaring that 
nothing but gold and silver money should be received in payment 
for Government lands, the sales of which had then been running 
up as high as ten or twelve million dollars a year. This of course 
added fuel to the fire, and increased and strengthened the train of 
disasters already set in motion. Under this state of things, the 
price of cotton had fallen very low, but the Bank, with the hope of 
aiding the planting interest, and sustaining itself before the pub- 
lic, embarked its entire capital in the purchase of cotton with the 
view of holding it till prices should rise. But no sooner was this 
policy known to the Democratic politicians than they filled the 
air with denunciations, and formed bargains and combinations 
with capitalists of Europe, and manufacturers throughout the 
world to stop the factories, and suspend purchases of cotton with 
the view of forcing prices still lower and breaking the Bank, and 
which did indeed reduce the price of cotton to almost nothing. 
Under this state of things, not only the Bank of the United States, 
but nearly every other bank in the United States went by the 
board, either failing outright or suspending specie payment. Un- 
der this state of things, nearly all the capital of the Bank of the 
United States amounting to thirty-five millions of dollars, which 
was held largely by the widows and orphans of this country and 
of Europe, was lost to the stockholders. 

Now, let us return to the tariff'. About this time the protective 
principle of the tariff was off, and of no effect. Under the enor- 
mously inflated currency of the country, the prices of everything, 
labor included, but cotton excepted, had greatly advanced. For- 
eign merchandise poured in, and flooded every corner of the land. 
Gold and silver, and even the copper cents, went abroad to pay 
for imports, or nad given place to bank notes, of doubtful value, 
and "shinplasters'' of no value at all ; thus adding to the disasters 
arising from the failure of the banks, and the general suspension 
of specie payments. Under this double pressure and double cause 
the crash that ensued may be likened to the bursting of a dam 
upon a manufacturing village, or a flood from the mountains, 
sweeping the harvests from the fields. The few banks that did 
not fail, curtailed, or utterly suspended their discounts and issues, 
and such currency as was in circulation came chiefly from swind- 
ling concerns, and the people soon found millions of dollars of 
worthless trash in their pockets. All new enterprises stopped, fac- 
tories stood still. Cotton planters, tobacco planters, and farmers 
of every kind, who bad obtained credit, as nearly all had, pulled 
up stakes and fled, like fugitives, from the face of collecting offi- 
cers or agents, taking their movable property with them, and 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 37 

leaving their immovables behind. Merchants everywhere became 
bankrupt, and either committed suicide or resolved to try some 
other pursuits. Vast numbers of well-dressed people roamed over 
the country in poverty and distress ; thousands who had kept 
their family vehicles and horses now trudged to church on foot, or 
stayed away to mourn over and conceal their destitution. Men, 
who had been counted well-to-do farmers with moderate debts 
hanging over them, now sought places as overseers to procure 
bread for themselves and families ; boss mechanics and boss man- 
ufacturers now sought humble places at daily wages, and thousands 
of laborers were driven to turn tramps, or seek a miserable existence 
remote from highways and markets. Churches and schools every- 
where languished, or were closed for want of funds to keep them 
open. Whole villages were dried up; their doors and windows 
nailed up, and the people gone. In a word, poverty covered the land, 
as with a pall, and this sad spectacle continued long enough, and 
was dark enough, for the gratification and satiety of the most 
rabid of the Democratic party. And, indeed, it may, with truth, 
be claimed that no financial crash ever known in the civilized 
world was so disastrous to any people as was this to the people of 
the United States. Old men look back upon it with as much hor- 
ror and dismay as do the young men upon the disasters of our 
great Democratic rebellion ; and all of which was brought about, 
as everybody now acknowledges, by the wreckless, faithless and 
barbarous policy of the Democratic party. 

SURPLUS REVENUE. 

Dem. Another question, Mr. R.: What have you to say of the 
surplus revenue which accumulated from the tariff" during the 
years 1834-'5-'6, amounting to some thirty millions of dollars? 
Did not these results go far towards demonstrating the oppressive- 
ness of the tariffs of 1828 and 1830, about which nullification was 
set on foot ? 

Rep. Not by any means. It only demonstrates, if it demon- 
strates anything touching the measures of those days, that in the 
first place, the country, owing to the wisdom and patriotism of 
former administrations, was in a prosperous condition, and sec- 
ondly, that the tariff on some articles was entirely too low, and 
that foreign goods were flowing into our country quite too freely 
and abundantly for our own good and safety. These tariffs were 
levied for four distinct purposes : first, revenue; second, to pay off 
the national debt; third, for protection to domestic industry and 
manufactures ; and fourth, to provide a fund for the aid of inter- 
nal improvements. And now, Mr. D., can you not see that if the 
system of internal improvements had been allowed to go on, as 
originally projected, and practised, that this surplus revenue 
would have been applied to an excellent purpose, and that by its 
aid, a railroad could have been constructed from Virginia to Ohio, 
and one from North Carolina to the same State, one from Georgia 
and one from Alabama, to the navigable waters of the Ohio river, 
leaving enough for river, harbor and other railroad improvements 
in other parts of the country? And above alJ, would not such an 
application of this money have done the entire Southern section 
of the Union great service, and rescued it from the poverty and 
weakness in which it has fallen, as the result of Democratic mad- 
ness and folly? And moreover, " how grandly," as Mr. Calhoun 



38 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

expressed it in 1817, " would the country have been intersected by 
lines of inter-communication east and west, north and south at 
thnt early day? And especially how grandly might the Southern 
States have been filled with industry, enterprise, and wealth, at 
that early day, 1830 to 1810, had such an application of this fund 
been made. And again, how much better this would have been 
at that time for the money to have been thus expended, drawing 
off, as it would have done, from the large cities those festering 
mass's of immigrants, ignorance and poverty, to make good 
citizens in the ruial districts, instead of leaving them in the 
crowded alleys as corrupt material with which to override the 
elective franchise, and assist Democratic demagogues to mount 
into power and trample down the purity and safety of our political 
institutions. But lastly, instead of aiding these great and patri- 
otic works, inaugurated and prosecuted by the fathers, the Democ- 
racy having turned their batteries, and the force of the party 
against this policy, after much discussion and corrupt maneuver- 
ing, turned these surplus millions over to the State governments 
to corrupt them, and be squandered, as was generally done in the 
States where Democracy predominated, upon bank charters and 
other schemes the managers of, and borrowers from, which were 
generally the men who voted the money, and from all of which 
the masses of the people received no benefit whatever. If such a 
policy, and such conduct on the part of the Democracy, and 
especially the Southern Democracy, did not constitute a striking 
case of Pelo de se on the part of the Democracy, we must refer 
the reader to the part it played in getting up the Great Rebellion, 
as proof of the instinctive or providential madness that seems 
ever to possess the party. 

THE BANE AND THE ANTIDOTE. 

Having now examined the course and conduct of the Democratic 
party, as touching the tariff, the bank and internal improvements, 
we must now touch upon the still more deleterious and dangerous 
moral and political principles, or rather upon its want of moral 
principles and practice. It is not now to be denied that the 
Democracy did as much to demoralize and lower the politics and 
morals of the country, during the twelve years of the Jackson and 
Van Buren administration, as the forty years and the six pure and 
patriotic administrations had done to improve and elevate the peo- 
ple. Nor would it be unreasonable or extravagant to say, that if the 
people of the United States had not enjoyed the good fortune of forty 
years of patriotic and honest rule, and had not been possessed of a 
large share of native good sense, and love of peace, law and order, 
a Democratic party, with its instinctive, anarchical and revolu- 
tionary tendencies, flushed and crazed with newly acquired power, 
would have plunged the people into anarchy or civil war before 
the expiration of the aforesaid decade; but owing to that forty 
years' rule, and their native good sense, it actually required over 
thirty years of Democratic demoralization and debauchery to 
enable its leaders to plunge the country into a civil war as they 
did in 1860 and 1861. Probably no other people on the face of the 
earth ever did or ever could stand the reign of a Democratic party 
half so long without anarchy and civil war. The French people 
were unable to stand a Democratic party for a single year without 
violence and bloodshed. 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 



THE GUILLOTINE. 



There is, and ever has been, a striking likeness between our 
^Democratic party, and the Democratic party of the French Revo- 
lution, both in principle and in practice. But I will only mention 
two or three points. It is well-known that the most prominent 
features of the French Democracy were the erection of the guillo- 
tine, and the lopping off oi the heads of the party's opponents, to 
get rid of their influence, and appease the voracious appetites of 
the rank and file of the Democratic party. So too, one of the first 
acts of the Jackson Democracy after its accession to power was 
the erection of the official guillotine on American soil. The next 
step was to introduce into the councils and civil service of the 
party the truly barbarous rule that "to the victors belong the 
spoils." We say truly barbarous, because such a rule only obtains 
among the lowest savage tribes, and that only in their bloody con- 
flicts, while it is generally discarded in the wars of civilized peo- 
ple, and especially is it discarded, and tabooed in every other civi- 
lized country except our own, and in truth was discarded, and 
tabooed in our country, until the advent of the Jackson Democ- 
racy. For the purpose then of carrying out this truly barbarous 
regime in the oft recurring national, state, and municipal elections 
in our country, the party at once erected this political and official 
machine. Our Democracy also resembles its French prototype in 
another respect. It had, and has to-day, its smelling committees, 
and spies all over the! and, and every human head, that had upon 
it the scent of anti-L^mocracy and of office, had to fall, with the 
savage motto ringing in its ears, "to the victors belong the spoils." 
2so merit, no fidelity to duty, no honor, nor claim for services ren- 
dered could escape from the sharp edge of this Democratic ma- 
-chine. All, however wise, and patriotic, had to give place to the 
ranting, raving, and hungry demagogues of the party. The con- 
sequence was that before the first Democratic decade was out, theft, 
robbery, and official plunder was the order of the day, and that 
only here and there was an honest official the exception to the 
rule and reign of plunder. Two Democratic officials in New York 
* stole a quarter of a million each of government funds, and one by 
the name of S wartout stole a million and a half of dollars. All of 
them escaped to Europe, and held fast to their booty. As some 
further evidence of this corrupt and dangerous state of affairs in- 
troduced by the Democracy, Mr. Webster tells us, in one of his 
speeches, that General Jackson said to him on one occasion: "Sir, 
I appoint, or try to appoint, honest men to office, but it seems to 
me they all turn rascals as soon as they get into places of trust." 
Thus we have an insight into the influence of this corrupt, and 
corrupting practice, and sentiment, and political and moral poison 
engrafted upon, or springing from, a Democratic party in the earliest 
stages of its existence, and thus authorizing and confirming the 
truth of Mr. Calhoun's remark, that "the party is kept together by 
the cohesive power of public plunder." 

FALSEHOOD AS A FINE ART. 

In commenting, therefore, on this civil service of the Democra- 
cy, it is but proper to remark further upon its morals, that if the 
party did not invent and introduce for the first time into the poli- 
tics of our country deliberate and systematic falsehood, defama- 
tion and calumny as its chief political currency and tactics, it 



40 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

certainly employed these weapons from hell to a greater and more 
efficient extent than ever before witnessed by modern civilization. 
Let any intelligent man take up and read a few copies of the old 
Washington Globe, in the light of facts and true history, and he 
can hardly divest himself of the idea that Satan, the father of 
lies, and the arch-fiend of the first great rebellion, held his court 
somewhere in the vicinity of Pennsylvania avenue, and found in 
Washington, among the newly-fledged Democracy, more true and 
faithful disciples of his majesty than were ever before assembled 
in an American city of the same size. And it is also but propei to 
say, that this party, instead of abandoning this currency of Satan, 
and these tactics, has, if possible, improved in the art and skill 
with which it wields falsehood, and but for the experience the 
American people have had of this party's want of truth and hon- 
esty, these means might be as disastrous as ever. The recent 
Garcelon tricks to seize the government of Maine, and the gusto 
with which the Democracy swallow and enlarge upon those tricks, 
afford a slight sample of the morals and the skill of the party in 
the use of its cherished weapons and tactics. And again the 
Jackson Democracy used to speak of its civil service practice, and 
the efficacy of its cherished weapons and tactics as victories and 
triumphs over what they called aristocracy and bloated nabobs of 
the land, but really meaning thereby the subordination of the intelli- 
gence, virtue and statesmanship of the country to a few unscrup- 
ulous leaders, and the brutal ignorance and vice of a still lower 
class of demagogues. Truly there was much reason to fear, as the 
virtue and intelligence of the land did always fear, that when 
such a party was driven from power, it would rise in rebellion, 
and seek the destruction of the government. And now, if after 
forty years from the overthrow of this party, and its great insur- 
rection against the government, the moral pollution and barba- 
rism it introduced can be wiped out or stamped out, and the peo- 
ple brought back to their original purity and love of truth under 
the first forty years under the Constitution, fortunate and happy 
indeed will be that generation of our children and grand-children. 
Truly, as one of the revolutionary statesmen said, "Democracy is 
the worst of all political evils." 

DEMOCKACY IN THE STATE. GOVERNMENTS. 

It has not been the aim of these articles to give a complete his- 
tory of the Democratic party down to the present time, or recount 
its stupendous crimes ana frauds in getting up its great rebellion, 
or to portray its utter abandonment of truth and honesty, or its 
audacious hypocrisy touching civil rights, and the elective fran- 
chise, since the rebellion was suppressed. But it is, and has been, 
the purpose to examine the origin and early history of the party, 
and to demonstrate from history that a truly Democratic party, 
in name or organization, means, ever has meant, and ever must 
mean, not the removal or reform of any evils or abuses in govern- 
ment, but a disorganization, or the uprooting and overthrow of 
civil Government, however pure and just it may be, and the pre- 
paration of the people for any and every crime that is possible for 
political leaders to invent or to inflict upon society. The true his- 
tory of any party, or political leaders, can only be correctly writ- 
ten when a generation or two has passed away. The time has 
come when the origin and early history of the Democratic party 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 41 

can be and should be given to the American people correctly. This r 
at least in part, bb claimed to be done in these articles. 

Again, it was not the intention at the outset of this examination 
to traveloutside of the national politics and history; but upon reflec- 
tion, their was found to be two much evidence of Democratic par- 
alysis in the States and their politics to allow its stagnating and 
mischievous influence therein to be passed over without some no- 
tice. Hence the following remarks, which will be followed with 
some further allusions and illustrations of the origin, growth and 
treasonable character of that part of Democracy called State sov- 
ereignty. 

It is well known that the Democratic party had the virtual 
control and direction of the general Government from 1829, a space 
of thirty-two years, from the inauguration of Andrew Jackson to 
the inauguration of Abraham Lincoln, in 1861. It also had the 
control and direction of most of the State governments during the 
same time, and the control, either in the name or essence of De- 
mocracy, of several of the^tates from the adoption of the Consti- 
tution of the United States ; but the upward progress of the people 
and country, as a whole, when free from the control of the 
Democracy, and from the broad and rapid strides toward wreck, 
ruin, and civil war, when under its control, have already been 
given. But, as touching the State governments, and State inter- 
ests, let it be remembered, that the chief and paramount part of 
each State Constitution and government is found in and derived 
from the Constitution and Government of the United States, which 
exercise a controlling, a restraining and a stimulating influence 
over the States and the people, thus very much curtailing the power 
of the State governments for evil when thus inclined. And here 
it may be remarked, as well as in any other place, that all that is 
counted valuable and progressive, or sound and safe in American 
legislation, jurisprudence and economy, has been achieved in the 
absence of a Democratic party, or in spite of, or in opposition to, its 
influence, both in State and National councils, except, perhaps, in 
some measures of minor importance. The early education, the 
customs, habits, and modes of thought, formed and strengthened 
in the absence of Democratic influence, have always comprised a 
very important and powerful influence upon the crazy vagaries 
and mad schemes of Democracy in the States, thus confining it to 
very narrow limits, and compelling it, in many instances, to follow 
in the footsteps of wisdom, virtue and experience. Yet, it is not 
to be denied, that whenever and wherever Democracy has had a 
long, unbroken reign in a State, its deleterious and baneful influ- 
ence has been, or rather is, notably conspicuous and striking to all 
observers. 

Take, for instance, the two great States of Virginia and Massa- 
chusetts. We say two great States, for they led all the other 
States in point of greatness and influence at the time of the Revo- 
lution, and the formation and adoption of the Constitution of the 
United States ; although Virginia contained then, and still con- 
tains, more than five times as much territory and ten times as 
many natural resources as Massachusetts. In Massachusetts the 
reign of Democracy ended with the downfall of Shay's insurrec- 
tion of 1786, never again to return to power in that State. Of the 
continual growth in education, intelligence and wealth, and the 
greatness of her sons, we hardly need speak. Even her sterile soil 



42 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

and inhospitable climate have been compelled, through the art 
and intelligence of her citizens, to contribute to her greatness. At 
about the same time of Shay's insurrection in Massachusetts, 
Democracy, with its wild visions of licentious liberty, with its 
hostility to taxation for public schools and free education, took 
complete and full possession of Virginia, and, either in name or 
form, has been the ruling power in that State from that time to 
the present. The effect, the result, is everywhere as apparent as 
were the plagues and darkness of Egypt in the times of Moses, 
This great State — great now only in the size of her territory— and 
her former great men, occupying the very centre and highway of 
the nation's traffic, with unsurpassed resources and natural ad- 
vantages of climate and soil, nevertheless, under the continued 
paralysis of Democracy, which no physician has been able to cure, 
after abandoning the principles and practice of all her great men, 
after shedding the blood of her sons to overturn and uproot the 
institutions planted by their hands, still remaining under the 
baleful influences of Democracy, has at last fallen into bankruptcy 
and dishonor, repudiation, and the deptns of poverty itself. Shade 
of Washington, shades of Madison, Jefferson and Randolph ! 
What has caused this mighty fall in this modern Paradise of the 
American continent but that word, that party name, which is, 
and ever has been, a synonym for hypocrisy and political knavery 
since its first entrance into the ancient Paradise of Greece. 

Perhaps it should here be remarked that the continuance of 
slavery in Virginia, and its absence in Massachusetts, had much 
to do with the progress of one and the retardation of the other. 
But it is nevertheless logical and just to conclude that a party 
name, and organization, which claims to be synonymous with 
freedom, equality and human rights, and, at the same time, allies 
itself with slavery in its most oppressive form, and thereby exhib- 
iting the rankest hypocrisy between its professions and practice, 
may indeed be charged with the chief evils of weakness, poverty, 
and ignorance, and, in fact, with all the shortcomings of the 
Southern; States as compared with the Northern States. With 
out the introduction of this hypocritical and anti-progressive or- 
ganization we may reasonably conclude that slavery, under any 
other party name or organization, could never have been so badly 
managed, or pushed into a war against a constitutional govern- 
ment, or, if it could, history furnishes no parallel case ; but, his- 
tory does teach us that, in the absence of a Democratic party, and 
under every other party-name and organization, slavery has 
eventually yielded to the dictates of humanity and the moral 
sense of mankind, and has always consented to a peaceable eman- 
cipation rather than risk a war in its behalf. Under any other 
name or organization, it is quite certain that Virginia would soon 
have adopted emancipation — emancipation being the prevailing 
sentiment before modern Democracy took its rise ; and, if this be 
true, it is right and just to charge upon Democracy the chief draw- 
back on Virginia and many other Southern States, and that it is 
still the power which holds them down to poverty and weakness. 

But perhaps a still better illustration of the evil effects of Dem- 
ocracy is found in the history of Pennsylvania. In that State 
the earlier Democratic party took deep root, and as firm a hold 
perhaps now upon the people, as it did in Virginia ; for there it 
defeated nearly all the early attempts at reform and political im- 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 43 

Erovements, rendering the State government itself to a condition 
ardly better than a mob, or an oligarchy, for many years. Out 
of this anarchical state of affairs grew the whiskey insurrection, 
during the first administration of Washington, which was put 
down with militia called in from other States. But for the first 
forty years after the adoption of the Constitution the spirit or es- 
sence of Democracy continued to control the State quite as abso- 
lutely, as it has controlled Virginia up to this time. During this 
long reign of Democratic opposition to all progress, the early Ger- 
man settlers with their science and literature had passed away, 
and in their place had sprung up a race of boors, who gloried in 
ignorance and animal indulgence. It is true the vast natural 
resources, and the absence of slavery in the State induced a steady 
influx of enterprising men from the educated communities, which 
caused its wealth to increase; but owing to the darkness caused 
by Democratic rule resting on the native population, this in- 
crease of wealth fell mainly into the hands of citizens from 
other communities, where the free school system had prevailed ; 
thus leaving the native Pennsylvanians to be but little better 
than hewers of wood and drawers of water for their more enlight- 
ened competitors. From 1830 to 1835, a man might travel through 
leagues of thickly populated country, in Pennsylvania, and 
scarcely find a man, women or child, who could read or write 
in any language. But fortunately, during these dark days, as all 
Pennsylvanians know, there was a moral and political awaken- 
ing anions: the people, and the traveler through the rural dis- 
tricts would be hailed a dozen times a day to give the news, and 
if by chance, he could read, and had a Democratic newspaper 
along, he woulo^be almost compelled to stop and read it through, 
to listening crowds, and if by chance it contained an effusion from 
Thomas H. Benton, or the Washington Globe against the Bank, 
the Tariff, Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, or John C. Calhoun, the 
Dutch guffaw would make the neighborhood ring with its lively 
tones. About this time, also, Pennsylvania, in her ambition to 
compete with New York, had incurred heavy debts for internal 
improvements, and as the taxes for the payment of interest be- 
gan to press upon the people, Democratic demagogues, as every- 
where else, began to agitate for repudiation. The condition was 
alarming ; but as the providence of God would have it, about this 
time a few old Federalists and Whigs throughout the State began 
to agitate for free schools for all the children, to be upheld and 
supported by State tax and State authority. The movement was 
blest, the great and good work grew apace, the prayers of good 
men and women were everywhere heard in its behalf ; so that in 
less than ten years from the beginning of the discussion, educa- 
tional tifixes were levied, and free schools were established in 
every neighborhood, except a few of the dark and most Demo- 
cratic corners, where for several years the schools were kept at 
bay by threatened Democratic riots, and insurrections against 
them. But even these yielded at last. 

And now, what has been the result? Under the blows struck 
for free education, and general diffusion of knowledge, the thick 
cloud of Democratic ignorance, and obstinacy was soon broken 
through, and the light of ages came pouring down upon the peo- 
ple. Vice and depravity began to give place to law, order, and to 
progress. The cry of repudiation ceased in the land, and the na- 



44 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

tive population began to see, and appreciate their great resources, 
and profit by them, instead of leaving the cream and honey to be 
carried away by strangers. Agriculture which was in a crude 
state, and the undeveloped mechanic arts soon began to wear 
everywhere a new face, and afford augmented rewards to the 
toilers; and to-day the Keystone State is indeed the keystone and 
model manufacturing and farming community of the nation. And 
thus while during the first forty years under our great national 
charter, this great State stood almost still, under the paralysis of 
Democracy, yet during the last forty or forty-five years, under its 
educational era, its wealth, its enterprise, and its intelligence have 
been wonderfully increased and from nothing given for schools, 
and education, except what the private charity and benevolence of 
the liberal afforded, the SUte now taxes herself over nine million 
dollars annually, for the enlightenment of her sons and daughters, 
while her progress, and her wealth, under this era of intelligence, 
have become almost fabulous. And thus we might go on in the 
political history of all the states, showing that in each and every 
instance, when Democracy has had its full sway, ignorance and 
vice, stagnation, and comparatively slow progress, became the 
leading characteristics of the community, and that in all cases 
where a break was made in the serried ranks and the dark clouds 
of Democracy, then it was, and then only, that these communities 
entered upon an onward and upward march in the arts and enter- 
prises of modern times. 

STATE SOVEREIGNTY. 

It is not proposed to enter upon a full discussion of a question 
which has employed the best legal minds and ablest statesmen of 
the country, but to give some facts and illustrations as to the na- 
ture, origin, growth and results of State rights, or "State sovereign- 
ty," as Democrats prefer to call the dogma. Less than this could 
hardly be expected in a discussion of the question before us. State 
sovereignty, or any other kind of local sovereignty, not warranted 
by the circumstances, is essentially Democratic, and Democracy 
is essentially local, and close akin to personal sovereignty, and 
which is in fact but a step from brutal and barbaric sovereignty, 
measured only by physical and personal strength. No purely 
Democratic party could fail, under any circumstances, to hoist 
State or local sovereignty of some kind as its first principle and 
standard of action; and by the same process of reasoning, no 
Democratic party, in name and organization, can fail to be a dis- 
union or a disorganizing party, whenever and wherever it exists, 
under an organized government, for every boy or student ten 
years old knows, or ought to know, that there is and can be but 
one sovereignty, or, what is the same thing, one supreme power in 
the same community or nation or people. Who has not heard, 
and who does not know, that " no man can serve two masters, for 
either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold 
to the one and despise the other." A government means a mas- 
ter, or supreme power, or several powers, each in its sphere, but 
one, as all know, must be the master, or supreme ruler, or arbiter 
of all the others in the same community; otherwise collisions, 
then divisions, and then complete separation takes place, that is 
to say, if a part is able to overthrow the whole ; in this case, the 
rebellious part becomes sovereign, but not otherwise. When, 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 45 

therefore, any leader or organization has secured the full belief and 
allegiance of the citizen to sovereignty in any local authority or 
government, he, or the organization, has secured his enmity and 
hatred of the general or paramount government, and his readiness 
to take up arms against such a government whenever he may be 
called on to do so, for no man can or will serve two masters. And 
now, whether all the authors and teachers of State sovereignty 
so intended or not, nothing could be more effective in breeding 
hatred and rebellion against the supreme government than this 
doctrine of State sovereignty. Nor can nor could any sentiment 
or principle of action be more effective for the delusion of the 
ignorant, and those frantic for public plunder and self aggrandise- 
ment, than this doctrine. It is not strange, therefore, that it 
became the chief element and corner-stone of the great Demo- 
cratic rebellion, as it ever has been, and ever will be, the favorite 
dogma of all Democrats, of all haters of law and order, and all 
aristocrats and royalists, who wish to dissolve a political union or 
to overthrow a well-settled government. It was the same politi- 
cal dogma which unsettled all Europe, and kept it in a semi- 
barbaric warfare and condition during the Dark Ages, and fgr a 
century or two after the gloom of ignorance was broken up by 
the civilized arts and Christian efforts. 

SOME LIGHT FROM JAMES MADISOTS. 

In the Democratic party which sprung up at the close of the 
Revolutionary war, but disappeared soon after the adoption of the 
Constitution, State sovereignty, as before observed, formed the 
chief tenet of the party, and was emploved by the demagogues of 
the day, not only to weaken the frail Union of the States — that is 
to say, frail in legal bonds and national powers, but strong in the 
moral sense, affections and patriotism of the people— but also to 
demoralize and distract the country, and to oppose the formation 
and adoption of the Constitution. It was these men, and this 
dogma, which constituted the great obstacles in forming the Con- 
stitution and in developing its legitimate powers. In alluding to 
this and other distracting causes, James Madison uses the follow- 
ing language : "As a natural consequence of this distracted and 
disheartening condition of the Union, the Federal authority had 
ceased to be respected abroad, and dispositions were shown there, 
particularly in Great Britain, to take advantage of its imbecility 
and to speculate on its approaching downfall. At homo it had 
lost all confidence and credit; the unstable and unjust career of the 
States had also forfeited the respect and confidence essential to 
order and good government, involving a general decay of confi- 
dence and credit between man and man. It was found, moreover, 
that those least partial to popular government or most distrustful 
of its efficacy, were yielding to anticipations that, from an increase 
of the confusion, a government might result more congenial with 
their taste or their opinions; whilst those most devoted to the 
principles and forms of Republics were alarmed for the cause of 
liberty itself at stake in the American experiment, and anxious 
for a system that would avoid the inefficacy of a mere Confeder- 
acy, without passing into the opposite extreme of a consolidated 
government It was known that there were individuals who had 
betrayed a bias towards monarchy, and there had always been 
some not unfavorable to a partition of the Union into several 



46 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

Confederacies, either from a better chance of figuring on a sec- 
tional theatre, or that the sections would require stronger govern- 
ments, or, by their hostile conflicts, lead to a monarchial consoli- 
dation. The idea of dismemberment had recently made its 
appearance In the newspapers." 

When therefore another Democratic party came into existence, 
its first and strong position was not only State rights, but "State 
sovereignty,'' as the balm for all the woes and dangers which 
they claimed afflicted the country. And whether the party as a 
whole intended this dogma as a wedge to split the Union asunder, 
or not, how naturally it led, and how dextrously it was employed 
for this purpose, is too well known, and too well remembered to 
need further comment here. Nor is there probably in the history 
of the world, a case of rebellion, or civil warfare against a supreme 
government, in which local sovereignty did not figure in some 
shape as a pretext and chief lever of the rebellion. 

LOCAL PREROGATIVES NOT TO BE REPUDIATED. 

It is not to be inferred by these arguments, and illustrations that 
lo#al governments and local prerogatives are useless, or improper 
in the great scheme of constitutional government and political 
liberty. In all, or nearly all civilized nations, local governments, 
more or less free to conduct local affairs, have been found. Our 
National government and the State governments differ but little in 
practice from those found in other countries. The large cities of 
Europe, and many of the smaller States possess and exercise under 
the supreme government, powers and prerogatives similar to those 
of our States. And it is unquestionably in accordance with well 
regulated liberty to foster and sustain such governments to the 
full extent and safety of the whole. But it is not to be denied or 
refuted, that the fathers of the Constitution were right in contend- 
ing as they did, that the chief danger to the system, and a Repub- 
lican form of government, like the one they proposed, was from 
the encroachment of the States, rather than from usurpations by 
the supreme government. Nor is it to be denied that Europe, and 
the people generally, have suffered far more from the little sov- 
ereignties, or pretended sovereignties, than from the encroach- 
ments of the supreme governments upon them. Bear in mind, 
good reader, we are not discussing the forms of government, but 
the practices and rights under them. The usurpations of Oliver 
Cromwell, and Napoleon Bonaparte were of short duration, and 
soon gave way to the spirit of liberty and independence. But the 
petty little despots in the little states of Europe have ground the 
people in the mills of poverty from generation to generation, and 
from century to century. And so, indeed, might some of our 
States, but for the Constitution and government of the United 
States, become, in the name of Democracy, grinding despotisms, 
as did indeed the government of Rhode Island from 1780 to 1789, 
and as in several other States at the present time. Hence it is not 
to be denied, that the fathers of the government were right, in 
teaching, as they did, that the chief danger of the system was 
from the ambition of the States. 

Everybody knows, or ought to know, that the great difficulty 
and danger of a Republican form of government has been the 
want of strength, and power to sustain itself against local insur- 
rections and Democratic disintegration. And the truth of the 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 47 

matter is, and is likely to be, in our country, that too much cen- 
tralism will come, if it ever shall come upon us from the over- 
throw and defilement of the elective franchise, by a Democratic 
party. Certain it is that no encroachment has been made, or at, 
tempted to be made, upon the rights and prerogatives of the States 
by the Government of the United States, during the ninety years 
of its existence, unless perchance some such construction might be 
placed on some of its war measures during the great civil war ; 
whereas, on the other hand, aside from the civil war days, several 
attempts have been made by the States to encroach upon the 
powers belonging to the supreme government, and did in truth, 
before the civil war. succeed in several cases. History is full of 
illustrations and proofs, that herein lies the chief danger to a Re- 
publican form of government, and not in the accumulation of too 
much power at the center. Notwithstanding our great civil war, 
notwithstanding the vast armies asssembled, and the vast power 
assumed by the povernment in the terrible conflict, and notwith- 
standing the alarming predictions and books written by learned 
men and patriots to prove that at the first break in the chain of 
States, the Constitution and the republican fabric would fall, and 
personal rights and liberties sink to rise no more under the Amer- 
ican flag — notwithstanding all this, let it be remembered the rights 
of the States, the rights and liberties of the people, so far as they 
depend upon the National government, are as perfect and safe, nay, 
even more perfect and safe than they were before the great conflict 
of arms took place. And now one more thought upon this impor- 
tant subject. If with the grand Constitution of the United States, 
providing as it does for the election of a Chief Magistrate once in 
four years by the people ; of the popular branch of the Congress, 
once in two years ; of the members of the Senate, once in six 
years by the States — and all, without exception, to be selected 
from the people of the States, and with other wise constitutional 
provisions for the integrity of the States, including the courts, and 
many other needful matters, if then we, the people of the United 
States, cannot guard and maintain a republican form of govern- 
ment, and well regulated liberty, peace and tranquility for our- 
selves and our posterity — then, indeed, is morality a farce, polit- 
ical science a dream, regulated liberty a delusion, and patriotism 
a mockery to be trodden down by wild Democracy, or, its coun- 
terpart, irresponsible despotism. 

*' STRICT CONSTRUCTION.'' 

One branch, or one progeny, of State sovereignty is, what is called 
by the Democracy " Strict construction of the Constitution." Sound 
and liberal construction, or interpretation, of the Constitution, in all 
its parts, and under all circumstances, is unquestionably in accordance 
with the will and interest of the whole people \ but when the people of 
Ireland were starving, in 1847, there was no provision found in the 
Constitution of the United States authorizing the Government to afford 
them relief ; yet the Government did send them ship -loads ofbreadstuffs, 
in accordance with a higher law from the God of nations, and no strict 
construe tionistwas able to enter a caveat against it. It is said that a crim- 
inal is entitled to have the law construed strictly in his favor. If, then, 
a suffering people must have a strict construction of their fundamental 
law, let them at least have the privileges of the culprit in favor of 
peace ..protection, and safety of life and limb. When, therefore, a> 



48 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

conspiracy, or any other plot, is on foot to overthrow and rend asunder 
the government of the land, surely the Constitution should be con- 
strued in favor of the life of the Government and the people. Let 
casuists, demagogues and State sovereigntyists argue as they may; 
this is common sense, common honesty, and common justice. But 
strict construction of the Constitution, as held by the Democracy, is 
very much like the ancient etiquette of the Spanish Court, which pre- 
scribed every movement of the monarch, and also the part that each 
servant or official about him had to perform, or abstain from perform- 
ing. Under these rules it so happened, that the officials whose busi- 
ness it was to move the king in his chair had placed him near a newly- 
made fire, while they retired to attend to some other matters But on 
their return they found the monarch roasted alive, because there was 
no official present whose duty it was to remove him. Or, it. may be 
likened to the treatment of their monarch by the Chinese ministers, 
who is generally a young sprig of royalty, or an "heir of the sun,'' 
whom they seclude from all eyes except those of high officials and 
dignitaries, and use his name, or title, as best suits their purposes. 
either to promote their own fortunes, or sanction a plot for his own 
destruction. Or, perhaps, a still more apt illustration of strict con- 
struction by the Democracy is found in the case of a noted and valua 
ble prisoner, captured by some American savages. They at first use 
him to obtain all the information and other advantages they can; they 
next use him in the day of battle as a breastwork between them and 
their enemy; but, when they can no longer use him for such purposes, 
they tie him to a tree, fill his flesh with lighted splinters, or shoot him 
to death with their arrows. 

Such is Democratic strict construction of the Constitution when 
allied with " State sovereignty." 

THE CHIEF CORNER-STONE OP DEMOCRACY BECOMES THE CHIEF 
CORNER-STONE OF THE GREAT REBELLION. — STRANGE POLITICAL 
ETHICS. — THE GRAND SULTAN SPEAKS FOR THE PARTY. 

As remarked near the commcement of this chapter, "Gen. Jackson 
proved to be the most apt and congenial leader for such a party, and 
that portion of mankind which abhor civil government and laws that 
could have been found in all the land." Did these early Democratic 
leaders wish for partizan, or any other purpose, to overthrow the in- 
ternal improvement system established by the fathers of the Govern- 
ment ? Jackson was ready to launch all his official powers against it, 
and repeat his blows in season and out of season. Did they wish for a par- 
tizan or any other purpose, to destroy the currency which Washington 
and his compatriots had sanctioned for the people? Jackson was ready 
with his official thunderbolts to embark in the warfare. Did they see 
a way to make party capital by attacking the protective tariff ? Jack- 
son was ready, sword in hand to cut right and left till it should fall. 
Did they desire, for some partizan purpose, to have the Constitution 
and laws arbitrarily violated ? Jackson was ready to "take the re- 
sponsibility," and lead as far as the most reckless would follow. Did 
they wish, at any time, to invoke the "State sovereignty" dogma ? 
Jackson was ready to go beyond even the boldest and most unscru- 
lous of its advocates, in elevating this heresy above the Constitution 
and the laws. Jackson was, therefore, with all his patriotic impulses, 
which doubtless were many and strong, whether he knew it or not, 
the most pliant agent and the most ready and efficient instrument in 
the hands of unscrupulous politicians, that could possibly have been 
found in all the land. 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 49 

Prom the time that the warfare was waged by the Jackson men upon 
Adams and his party, cries of "usurpation, monarchy, and oppression" 
rolled in thunder tones from every Democratic throat, and for all these 
grievances, State sovereign t} r ,. State resistance, and nullification were 
invoked as the rightful remedies by thousands of Democratic orators, 
and every Democratic newspaper in the country. And yet, against 
what was all this noise and confusion directed ? Not against anything 
wrong, but against men, measures, and the administration of the laws, 
as pure, as sound and as patriotic as were ever seen in this or any other 
land. It was in answer to these bowlings of Democratic Dervishes, 
that Andrew Jackson, the President of the United States, and Grand 
Sultan of the Democratic party, placed State sovereignty above the 
Constitution, and his solemn oath, taken to support that Constitution, 
and therein and thereby laying the foundation of not only nullification, 
but of the Great Rebellion of 1861 and 1865, at tha very origin of this 
modern Democratic party, as we shall now see. 

Up to the beginning of this party, it was supposed by plain and 
honest people, that the chief business of the President of the United 
States was to look after and take care of the affairs of the United States 
as a nation, leaving the several States to take care of themselves, and 
their rights. In a word, the 'Constitution says of the President, be- 
fore he enters upon the duties of his office, he shall take the following 
oath or affirmation : "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faith- 
fully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to 
the best of my ability preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution 
of the United States " But at the very time of t&king this solemn oath, 
in his first inaugural address, March 4, 1829, Jackson sai$, - In regard 
to the rights of the separate States, I hope to be animated by a proper 
respect for those sovereign members of the Union, taking care not to 
confound the powers they have reserved to themselves, with those they 
have granted to the Confederacy." 

The term, Confederacy, has been but seldom, if ever used by any 
other President of the United States in designating the Union, or the 
nation. And assuredly the term "sovereign members," or its equiva- 
lent, as applied to the States, would unquestionably have grated harshly 
on the ears of Washington, or of an} other President before Jackson. 
Certain it is Jefferson did not use the term sovereignty, or State sov- 
ereignty, even in his famous Kentucky Resolutions, or any of his 
official documents, not even in the Declaration of Independence, when, 
if ever, sovereignty could be claimed by a colony or State, that is, in 
the sense in which it is used by the Democracy. Some charitable 
friends of Jackson may have claimed that this clause in his address A 
was intended merely as a tub to the whale, or for the amusement of * 
the Southern Democracy in particular. 

But let us see what he says in his first annual message to the Con- 
gress, December 8, 1829: 

"I cannot, therefore, too strongly or too earnestly, from my own 
sense of its importance, warn you against all encroachments upon the 
legitimate sphere of State sovereignty Sustained by its healthful and 
vigorous influence, the Federal system can never fall." 

Was it madness, or was it unaccountable blindness and stupidity, 
that inspired such language in a President of the United States, just 
after taking the oath of office? Let us hope it was the latter, and that 
from this blindness some signal benefit was ultimately to come upon 
the country through the overruling hand of Providence. 

In the Bank veto message, July 10, 1832, General Jackson uses the 
following disorganizing and dangerous language against one of the 



50 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

three great departments of the government, and which it was his sworn 
duty to "preserve, protect and defend " as a part of the Constitution: 

"The Congress, the Executive, and the Court must, each for itself, 
be guided by its own opinion of the Constitution. Each public officer 
who takes an oath to support the Constitution, swears that he will sup- 
port it as he understands it, and not as it is understood by others. Tt 
is as much the duty of the House of Representatives, of the Senate, 
and of the President, to decide upon the constitutionally of any bdl or 
resolution which may be presented to them for passage or approval as 
it is of the Supreme Judges when it may be brought before them 
for judicial decision: the opinion of the Judges has no more authority 
over Congress than the opinion of Congress has over the Judges; and, 
on that point, the President is independent of both. The authority of 
the Supreme Court must not, therefore, be permitted to control the 
Congress, or the Executive, when acting in their legislative capacities, 
but to have only such influence as the force of their reasoning may 
deserve." 

And, lastly, in what is know as his farewell address, dated March 3, 
1837, he says : " Every friend of our free institutions should be always 
prepared to maintain, unimpaired and in full vigor, the rights and 
sovereignty of the States, and confine the action of the general govern- 
ment strictly to the sphere of its appropriate duties." 

Surely such language from the President of the United States, and 
such a disregard of solemn oaths and weighty responsibilities, would 
undoubtedly have been regarded, in the earlier days of the Republic, as 
treasonable, nor can it be counted much better at the present day. But, 
by way of anology for Jackson, it may be remarked that his partizans 
had horribly demoralized and corrupted the politics of the day, and 
that hundreds and thousands of such sentiments and declarations were 
afloat from Democratic presses, leaders, reports and platforms, in every 
part of the land, beguiling even more sagacious men than Jacksun to 
believe that this dogma had become the political faith of the people. 
In this manner was State sovereignty dug up from the ashes of the 
past, newly dressed, newly polished, and, like the Trojan horse, intro- 
duced among the people, and was adopted by the Democracy as the 
chief corner-stone; and, whether so intended by Jackson or not, it 
became, by his aid, the chief corner stone of the great rebellion, which 
was then and there virtually set on foot by the Jackson Democracy. 
And all of which was accomplished under the lying pretext that there 
was great danger of usurpation and monarchy from the Whig party, 
while there never was, and never had been, a shadow of ground for 
such a charge or such a danger, except ft was to come from some bru- 
tal Democratic chieftain. And yet all these utterances and noise afford 
but a faint idea of the manner and spirit with which the most impor- 
tant measures, and the very foundations of the government itself, were 
assailed by these Democratic conspirators. For several years the 
Senate of the United States was an object of attack by the entire crew 
of Democratic writers as an aristocratic and useless branch of the gov- 
ernment, standing in the way of, and often thwarting, the Democratic 
will. Then again, in keeping with these Democratic ethics, and the 
indecent and dangerous language of Jackson quoted above, the Demo- 
cratic orators ana* writers of every grade hurled their denunciations 
upon the Supreme Court of the United States as if they intended to 
tear its right to existence from the Constitution of the government, 
while, in several cases, State sovereignty was invoked to annul its de- 
crees. And thus was the hydra-headed thing called State sovereignty 
installed as the chief corner-srone and doctrine of the great Democratic 



DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 51 

party in its very beginning, and, as it proved to be, in the great Dem- 
ocratic rebellion. 

But, say the Democracy of this day, "did not Jackson put a stop to 
nullification, and did not the Democracy as a whole sustain him ?" 
Jackson did, indeed, put forth his proclamation, of December 11th, 
1832, which gave a check to that attempted practical application of the 
State sovereignty theory. But the question was then, and still is, was 
not this attempted nullification of the laws of the United States by 
South Caro ina in exact accordance with the teachings of the entire 
Democratic party ? and, especially with the official teachings of Jack- 
son ? as given in the foregoing extracts from his messages, all of which, 
and several others, except the last one, were before the public prior to 
the adoption of the South Carolina Nullification Ordinance. Or, in 
other words, had not the South Carolinians good ground to conclude 
that their action was in perfect accord with the State sovereignty 
theory then rampant ? and that the entire Democratic party would 
sustain their action ? 

But the truth of the matter is not, that nullification was con- 
trary to the State sovereignty theory, but that the movement on the 
part of solid Democratic South Carolina was premature, and at too 
early a day for it to ripen into a formidable rebellion, the people not 
having been sufficiently corrupted and contaminated by the Democracy 
to permit such a calamity to take place. Then, again, Jackson, with 
all his faults, was no Buchanau, nor a feeble functionary, to stand by 
and see a bold and reckless defiance of his authority, his dignity, and of 
the plain words and spirit of the law-. And hence, that sound document, 
called the Nullification Proclamation, said to have been written by 
Daniel Webster, which proved to be a Columbiad charged with shot 
and shell, and which, for the time being, laid the ghost of strict con- 
struction, State sovereignty, nullification and secession. But, as expe- 
rience has shown, all these isms are the outgrowth of a Democratic 
party, Democratic instincts, and the teachings of such men as such a 
party always brings to the surface, riding and overriding the good men 
of the party until anarchy, or revolution of some kind, is the result. 
As before remarked, therefore, the nullification campaign was nothing 
more than the natural outgrowth of a Democratic party, its leaders 
and its organs, it being a little premature, or episodical, in the great 
march of Democracy to anarchy, or a bloody revolution of some kind, 
which end was predicted hundreds of times by the old Whig patriots 
of that day, and culminated in the great rebellion. 

CONCLUSION. 

In closing this examination, it may be remarked that it has been 
made evident ti^at Democracy, as an organization, does not mean a 
government by the people, but rather a state of anarchy, or the reign 
of a mob, or, at best, a chronic state of insurrection against law and 
a stable government, ready to break forth into open revolution wherever 
and whenever such a party has sufficient strength; and that, instead 
of a Democratic party ever having founded well-regulated liberty, or a 
government of any kind, it has, in all ages and in all countries, found 
its chief support and strength among the most ignorant and depraved 
elements of society — the very elements which government is required 
to restrain— and has ever been found ready to launch these elements 
against the most intelligent, wise, patriotic and moral portions of 
society. Instead of its ever having been a party to strengthen the 
cords and lay the foundations of good society, its mission and instinct 
has ever been to uproot and overthrow all that the good and virtuous 



52 DEMOCRACY EXAMINED. 

have been able to build up — brute force being its ehief reliance, and 
the cohesive power of public plunder its chief incentive to action. It 
has been shown that a Democratic party knows, and can know, no 
other method for the accomplishment of its aims and ends than the 
elevation of, and the adhesion to, a despotic chief; and that, instead 
of selecting or standing by a patriotic and safe leader, it never fails to 
cast such aside to give place to the most crafty and unscrupulous in 
its ranks, its chief delight being calumny and falsehood heaped upon 
the virtuous and great, and seeing them driven from all places of 
honor and trust. 

It has been shown that instead of the Democratic party being the 
friend of the poor and laboring portion of the people, it is, and always 
has been, the party that brings derangement, destitution and distress 
upon them, by the overthrow of wise and patriotic measures, and that 
instead of its being the friend of true liberty and equal rights, it has 
ever tended and co-operated to bring about despotic rule in its most 
unjust and insupportable form, ever preparing the ground for a crop 
of aristocrats or hereditary rulers in the end. Instead, therefore, of a 
Democratic party being the dread and scorn of aristocracts and royal- 
ists, it forms the very condition of things such men like to see, know- 
ing, as they do, that it presents the open and direct way to aristocratic 
and royal rule. The old proverb, that "extremes meet, '' has been 
fully verified in every case wherever Democracy has gained full and 
complete sway, the great leaders never failing, in the and, to use the 
masses of ignorance and depravity for the promotion of their own in- 
terests, their own elevation and permanent lease of power, or as food 
for powder, shot and shell, as was the case with the French Democracy 
under its great leaders, and as has been the case with American Democ- 
racy under its great leaders. It has been charged and proven that 
Thomas Jefferson, instead of being, as claimed, the father of modern 
Democracy, detested the word as a party name, and called himself a 
philanthrophist and a Republican, and his party by the same title. It 
has also been charged and demonstrated that a Democratic party is from 
its name, instincts and principles, opposed to education and the gen- 
eral diffusion of knowledge among the people, and uses its power, not 
to protect the rights and purity of the elective franchise, but to encour- 
age and defend dishonesty in voting, and fraud in counting and return- 
ing votes, thereby seeking to destroy the very foundations of civil lib- 
erty, equal rights, and government by the people. It has been charged, 
also, that its warfare is not against the vices of government, but against 
the government itself, ever seeking its overthrow, whatever its character 
may be, and to this end its chief tenet and only time honored princi 
ciple is State or local sovereignty, breeding thereby and therein utter 
contempt for national sovereignty, and evrything sacred and venerable 
in politics, morals snd history, and casting blight on all the noble aspi- 
rations and hopes of high civilization — the good, the virtuous and the 
wise; and affording aid and comfort to unscrupulous unprincipled 
and frantic ambition for power. After fifty years' trial of such a party, 
or, rather, after fifty years of menace and scourging, as it has be en to 
this country, and is likely to be as long as it exists, it beomes every true 
patriot and righteous man to labor and pray, night and day, for its 
utter overthrow and annihilation as a party organization. 



